Of course this difference does not absolutely represent the uncollected taxes, because the Government officials may have subsequently been able to secure collections from some of the delinquents. The delinquent column is also very greatly enlarged by reason of the fact that the Government authorities place in the hands of the Spanish Bank a large number of worthless receipts—that is, receipts in which the taxpayer is dead or the properties destroyed. This explanation, of course, exonerates the Spanish Bank, and shows that it collects the taxes in a businesslike way; but it does not change matters from a revenue point of view. That remains the same. It is probable, however, that under the new conditions it will be easy so to levy these taxes that they will yield annually from $4,000,000 to $5,000,000 in revenue. In thus proceeding the United States authorities will unquestionably abolish some of the most onerous.
The receipts from internal taxes are estimated as follows:
| INTERNAL REVENUE | |
| Stamped paper | $350,000 |
| Postage stamps | 300,000 |
| Stamped paper for payment to the State | 250,000 |
| Stamps for the same | 50,000 |
| Telegraph stamps | 40,000 |
| Bills of Health | 3,000 |
| Stamps for diplomas and matriculation | 90,000 |
| Stamped paper for municipal fines | 1,000 |
| Postal cards | 2,000 |
| Papal Bulls | 1,000 |
| Revenue stamps for drafts, etc. | 60,000 |
| “ “ “ receipts, etc. | 300,000 |
| Stamps on policies | 20,000 |
| Revenue stamp on consumption of matches | 260,000 |
| $1,727,000 | |
| Deduct commission for sale of the above | 86,350 |
| Total | $1,640,650 |
This source of revenue will be greatly increased under American control, though it will come from improved postal and telegraph facilities, increase in banking business, and other legitimate sources of internal revenue. The internal taxes of Cuba must be fully revised. If this work is intelligently performed, the same revenue can be obtained in a manner far less odious to the taxpayer.
This table practically completes the sources of Cuban revenue, for the miscellaneous sources are of an intermittent character, and the lotteries revenue is not likely to cut any figure in the future finances of the Island. In the next chapter the author will briefly consider how the money has been expended and give some suggestions as to the future division of the funds collected.
CHAPTER XVIII
HOW THE REVENUE WAS SPENT
IN dealing with expenditures, the factors become more certain quantities than those present in the forecasting of possible revenue. The money collected from Cuba, whether it was $26,000,000 or more, has all gone, and nothing was found in the treasury when the United States forces took possession but numerous evidences of promises to pay, records of receipts given by the Government for goods not paid for, and debts of all kinds, including the salaries of a large number of the minor officials. The first and most important item of expenditure is, as has been said, for sovereignty expenses, and aggregates a sum exceeding $22,000,000. These expenses are subdivided as follows:
| I. | Interest on Public Debt and General Expenses | $12,574,709.12 |
| II. | State Church, and Justice | 329,072.63 |
| III. | War | 5,896,740.73 |
| IV. | Navy | 1,055,136.13 |
| V. | Executive | 2,645,149.98 |
| $22,500,808.59 |
The largest single item in these expenditures is that of the interest on the public debt and general expenses, which aggregates $12,574,709.12. Of the total, about $10,500,000 undoubtedly found its way to Spain to pay interest and sinking-fund payments on the enormous debt which Spain had saddled upon Cuba. There has been much controversy over this debt, and as the discussion has ended by the American Peace Commission insisting on Spain’s assuming the debt, and thus freeing Cuba forever from the legal obligation, a brief review of the subject will be of interest to the reader. Owing to the fact that Cuba has been, until United States occupancy, a colony without personality and without real representation, the question of the public debt was never properly settled. The Spanish Government, the Cubans contend, arbitrarily burdened the Island with the weight of the whole war debt of 1868-78. The Cubans have rightly taken the ground that this debt was Spanish, not Cuban. As a matter of fact, the Spanish Government, during the insurrection of 1868-78, never admitted that there was any war in Cuba, affirming, on the contrary, that the trouble was only a disturbance limited to some parts of the Island, and that the immense majority of the population of Cuba were loyal Spaniards. The conclusion to be drawn from this official fact and from its assertion by the Government was that Cuba was not bound to pay the expenses of that revolt. A somewhat similar instance occurred in the Peninsula at the same time. The Carlist War was likewise a very serious disturbance spread over some important provinces of Spain. The cost, however, of that war was not charged to the revolted provinces, but was considered a national debt. Besides, there are some items which have been held as forming part of the Cuban debt, which by no means can be accepted as such. Thirty or forty years ago Spain sustained war with Mexico, San Domingo, and Peru, the cost of those three wars having been charged to the Cuban Treasury, which, since then, has annually paid the interest thereon. In 1878 or 1879, a general liquidation of Cuban accounts took place, in which the “Banco Hispano-Colonial” of Barcelona assumed a very important position. Probably the cost of the three above-mentioned wars (in Mexico, San Domingo, and Peru) and some other accounts were then settled.
Not even the smallest part of the whole debt has been employed in any kind of Cuban improvement. A memorandum prepared by the Cuban planters and addressed to Madrid in 1894 thus referred to the debt: