The History of Cuba, vol. 2

by Willis Fletcher Johnson

CHAPTER XVI

We must consider, in order rightly to understand the situation of Cuba at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and the momentous train of incidents in her history which then began, the salient features of the history of Spain at that time. The reign of Charles III. had temporarily restored Spain to a place in the front rank of European powers, with particularly close relations, through the Bourbon crowns of the two countries, with France. But that rank was of brief duration. In 1788 Charles IV. came to the throne, one of the weakest, most vacillating and most ignoble of princes, who was content to let his kingdom be governed for him by his wife's notorious lover. A few years later the Bourbon crown of France was sent to the guillotine, and then came the deluge, in which Spain was overwhelmed and entirely wrecked.

The first Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1796 made Spain little better than the vassal of France in the latter's war against Great Britain. That was the work of Godoy, the "Prince of the Peace" and the paramour of the queen. Against him Spain revolted in 1798 and he was forced to retire from office, only to be restored to it by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1800. Then came the second secret and scandalous Treaty of San Ildefonso, in which Spain was the merest tool and dupe of France, or of Napoleon; and in 1803 there followed another international compact under which Spain agreed to pay France a considerable yearly subsidy. A few years later occurred the French invasion, the abdication of Charles IV., the accession, then merely nominal, of Ferdinand VII., the imposition of Joseph Bonaparte, and the Peninsular War.

The effect of these events was two-fold, the two parts strongly contrasting. On the one hand, the Spanish national spirit was aroused as it had not been for many years. Napoleon's aggressions went too far. His ambition overleaped itself. In their resistance and resentment the Spanish people "found themselves" and rose to heights of patriotism which they had not scaled before. Concurrently they began the development of a liberal and progressive spirit of inestimable significance. They demanded a constitution and the abolition of old abuses which for generations had been stifling the life of the Peninsula.

On the other hand, the prestige of Spain in her trans-Atlantic colonies was hopelessly impaired, and her physical power to maintain her authority in them was destroyed. With French and British armies making the Peninsula their fighting ground, Spain had no armies to spare for the suppression of Central and South American rebellions. Thus while there was an auspicious renascence of national vigor at home, there was an ominous decline of imperial authority abroad. The work of Miranda, San Martin and Bolivar was thus facilitated and assured of success.

In domestic affairs, Spain showed some progress, even under her worst rulers. Godoy, vile as he was, abolished the savagery of bull-fighting and promoted the policing of cities and the paving and cleaning of streets, some advance was made in popular education, and the intellectual life of the nation began to emerge from the eclipse which it had been suffering. Possibly the most significant achievement of all was the development of an approximation to popular government, with an attempt to unify Spain and the colonies; which latter came too late. The Junta Central in January, 1809, declared that the American colonies were an integral part of the Spanish Kingdom, and were not mere appanages of the crown. This was revolutionary, but it was insisted upon by the Junta, and practical steps were taken to make the principle effective. The Junta was driven from Seville by Napoleon, whereupon it fled to Cadiz, and there, in superb defiance of the invader and oppressor, arranged for the assembling of a Cortes, or National Parliament, in which the colonies should be fully represented. This body, a single chamber, met in September, 1810, with elected representatives from the American colonies, including Cuba. Owing to the difficulty of getting deputies from America in time, however, men were selected in Spain to represent the colonies at the opening of the session.

A tangled skein of history followed. The Cortes, though far from radical in tone, was progressive and was sincerely devoted to the principle of popular government, and it insisted upon the adoption of the Constitution of 1812, under which the people were made supreme, with the crown and the church in subordinate places. All Spaniards, in America as well as in Europe, were citizens of the kingdom, and were entitled to vote for members of the Cortes and were protected by a bill of rights. In many respects it was one of the most liberal and enlightened constitutions then existing in the world.

The first act of the wretched Ferdinand VII., however, when Napoleon permitted him to return to Spain, was to decree the abrogation of this constitution and the establishment of a most repressive and reactionary régime which liberals were cruelly persecuted. The result of this was to promote the revolution which had already begun in America, and to provoke a revolution in the Peninsula itself; in the face of which latter Ferdinand pretended to yield and to consent to the summoning of another Cortes and the reestablishment of the Constitution of 1812. These things were effected in 1820. But the false and fickle Ferdinand made his appeal to the reactionary sovereigns of the Holy Alliance, with the result that in 1823 the French invaded Spain to suppress Liberalism, and those preparations were made for the resubjugation of Spain's American colonies which were frustrated by the promulgation of the Monroe Doctrine in the United States.

Meantime all the Spanish colonies on the American continents had not only declared but had actually achieved their independence. There were left to Spain in all the Western Hemisphere, therefore, only the islands of Cuba and Porto Rico; and they remained intensely loyal. When the legitimate King of Spain was deposed in favor of Joseph Bonaparte, Cuba made it plain and emphatic that she would not recognize the French usurper, but would remain true to Ferdinand VII. Again, when the colonies of Central and South America seceded and declared their independence, Cuba remained loyal to the kingdom. It was because of these two acts that Cuba became known at the Spanish Court as "Our Ever Faithful Isle."

For this contrast between Cuba and the rest of Spanish America there were three major reasons. One was, the insular position of Cuba, which separated her from the other Spanish provinces and their direct influence and cooperation, and which thus placed her at an enormous disadvantage for any revolutionary undertakings. The second was the character of the people. The Spanish settlers of Cuba had come chiefly from Andalusia and Estremadura, and were the very flower of the Iberian race, and from them had descended those who after three centuries were entitled to be regarded as the Cuban people. They retained unimpaired the finest qualities of the great race that in the sixteenth century had made Spain all but the mistress of the world, and they still cherished a chivalric loyalty to the spirit and the traditions of that wondrous age. In other colonies the settlement was more varied. Men had flocked in from Galicia and Catalonia, with a spirit radically different from that of Andalusians and Estremadurans. To this day the contrast between Cubans and the people of any other Latin-American state is obvious and unmistakable.