The History of Cuba, vol. 2

by Willis Fletcher Johnson

In his administration Santiago de Cuba took a significant step towards the more effective concentration of the literary activities of the island. This was the foundation of the first Sociedad de Amigos, which was approved of by the king and on the thirteenth of September, 1787, received a royal grant. In his colonial administration Espoleto tried to follow the example of Ricla and Buccarelli, ordering the publication of the decrees which they had enacted and which in the course of time had been forgotten, and did his best to enforce them. In this by no means easy task he was backed by D. José Pablo Valiente, an oidor of the Audiencia or judge of the Supreme Court, who had come to Havana in 1787 to start an inquiry into the disbursement of certain funds. By order of the king he had to investigate how the enormous sums, which the expeditions of the gallant Galvez had cost, had been invested; had to examine the state of the royal revenues and suggest needed reforms, watch the administration of justice and propose measures to raise the standard of the bar. One of the high officials who had given a previous administration trouble and was probably guilty of irregularities, Urriza, was so resentful of this investigation of his office, which D. Valiente was ordered to undertake, that he speedily resigned. He was succeeded by D. Domingo Hernani.

Death reaped a rich harvest between 1786 and 1788, in removing men so closely identified with the fate of the colonies and the mother country that they were not soon to be adequately replaced. On the thirtieth of November, 1786, D. Bernardo de Galvez died in Mexico, where he had reigned as viceroy since he left Havana eleven months before. By his rare executive talent and his extensive knowledge he had become one of the most efficient colonial governors that Spanish America had known, and to him was in a great measure due their progress and prosperity. A few days later died in Madrid his uncle D. José de Galvez, the noted minister of the Indies, whose name is also identified with colonial reforms. But the greatest loss to the colonies and to Spain was the death on the twenty-eighth of December, 1788, of King Carlos III. The kind and prudent sovereign had in a reign of almost thirty years, handicapped as he was by the Spanish tradition of absolutism, tried his best to further the growth and the welfare of his country and its dependencies, and inaugurated policies more liberal than any his predecessors had followed. He had endeared himself to his people and was sincerely mourned.

The accession of Carlos IV. to the throne of Spain was not calculated to advance Spain and her colonies beyond the degree of development they had attained during the long reign of his father. He was forty years of age and by stature and physiognomy was singularly fitted to represent so important a kingdom as Spain. But he was as unintelligent as ignorant, and allowed himself to be guided by his wife, Maria Louise, princess of Parma, who was as clever and scheming as he was dull and indolent. She was an autocrat, who suffered nobody to share the reins with her, and imperceptibly they slipped into her hands, until she was absolute sovereign of the kingdom. Two years after the death of Carlos III. Florida Blanca was forced to resign. Count Cabarrus, an ardent champion of reform, and a man of considerable executive power, was arrested. D. Gaspar Melchior de Jovellanos, one of the most profound thinkers and noblest patriots that Spain could claim in the eighteenth century, was removed from the important position he held in Madrid and exiled. Campomanes, too, fell into "disgrace" in 1791. All these men, distinguished for their character and their ability, were replaced by some feeble creatures with no idea or will of their own, puppets in the hands of the queen, who transformed the court of Madrid into a den of corruption.

The policies pursued by Spain during this time culminated in so much confusion that Florida Blanca was recalled in 1792 and set about to make an attempt at restoring order in a thoroughly disorganized government. But he was deposed the same year, having been unable to obtain the favor of the queen. Aranda, who during the previous reign had been the representative of progress, peace and the liberal ideas that came to Spain from France, followed him with no better luck. For he too was dismissed within a year and his place was taken by the queen's favorite, Manuel Godoy, who some years later was to turn up in Cuba. Godoy was a handsome young officer; she made him a grandee of the first class with the title of Duke of Alcudia, and entrusted him with the ministry of foreign affairs. The proud old aristocracy of Spain grumbled at the rise of the upstart; but it succumbed to the spirit of servility which pervaded the atmosphere of the court, and sought the favorite's favor.

Such was the condition of the country which was exercising a paternal authority over Spanish America. It was not calculated to tighten the bonds existing between the mother country and the colonies. As transportation increased and news began to spread more rapidly and to circulate more freely, the eyes of the colonists were opened to the iniquities they suffered, and they began to question institutions and laws which they had formerly unconditionally accepted. The glamor of the period of conquistadores had long faded; the excitement of the age of piracy was slowly being forgotten. Cuba, like all Latin America, had entered upon that period, which President Poincaré in his preface to Garcia Calderon's book on "Latin America" calls "the colonial phase with its disappointments, its illusions, its abuses and errors; the domination of an oppressive theocracy, of crushing monopolies; the insolence of privileged castes, and the indignities of Peninsular agents." It needed strong and noble men to guide her through the period of unrest which even at that moment was culminating in the French Revolution.

The immediate echoes of this Revolution were heard in 1791 in Hispaniola, where at the very first risings of the people in France, the slaves had revolted, killing their masters and burning their property. It was only the prelude to the greater insurrection, which broke out later and in which Cuba became involved. In the mean time, this island had come under another interim governorship, and was drifting along on the tide of progress in some directions, while in others it had come to a standstill, if it had not retrograded. The provisional government of D. Domingo Caballo which began on the twentieth of April, 1789, and ended on the eighth of July, 1790, was not noteworthy for any important measures, unless it be another attempt at restricting the number and the activities of lawyers. The royal decree of the nineteenth of November, 1789, which prohibited the admission of any more professors of jurisprudence, native or foreign, to the bar of the island, was modified to read thus: "To the profession of lawyer, only those shall be admitted who studied in the greater universities of their countries and had practiced in some of their capitals, where there existed a superior tribunal certifying that they had practiced six years at the superior courts of Spain."

During Caballo's interim rule there occurred the ecclesiastical division of the island. The archbishopric of Santo Domingo was divided into two suffragan dioceses, both the bishopric of Santiago de Cuba which had existed since 1518 and the new bishopric of Havana being subject to the metropolitan mitre of Santo Domingo. To the bishopric of Santiago was appointed D. Antonio Feliu, a man of great piety and gentle disposition, who rapidly won the esteem of the community and the love of his flock. That of Havana, which also comprised Louisiana and Florida, was entrusted to D. Felipe José de Tres Palacios.

In spite of the apparent prosperity, the island was still suffering from centuries of restriction which had paralyzed the initiative of its population. Maria de las Mercedes (Jaruco), Countess de Merlin, says of that period in her work, "La Havana" (Paris, 1844):

"Owing to the long tyranny which had weighed upon the island, Cuba needed hands to cultivate her fields. The products were devoured by a monopoly; territorial property did not exist; for the proprietor could not even cut a tree in his woods without the permission of the royal marine; the population was reduced to 170,370 souls; the sugar production had become so inferior in quality, that no more than 50,000 barrels of sugar annually left the port of Havana; finally, the island was involved in debts and Mexico was obliged to aid it in the necessary expenses of the administration and agriculture."

The author, a niece of the Conde de Casa Montalvo, who was identified with the great revival of civic spirit during the administration of Governor Las Casas, also limns a rather discouraging picture of the state of education in the island, saying that in the year 1792, Havana had only one grammar school, of which the mulatto Melendez was the teacher, and that up to the year 1793 girls were forbidden to learn to read. So thoroughly familiar was the author with the political and economic conditions of Cuba, and closely associated with the men, whose energy, integrity and patriotic ambition ushered in that wonderful era of progress, that the three volumes of her work, consisting of letters to Chateaubriand, George Sand, Baron Rothschild, and others are full of valuable information presented in a most fascinating manner.