The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-04-11
Presidents Message Sent to
Congress oday Asks
Authority
To INTERVENE IN SPANISH CUBAN WAR.
For the Purpose of Ending FIostiities IN
the Island.
Message Does Not Ask for the Recognition
Of Cuban independence.
Deferrng That Matter Until Later Tne-Great Crowds
of People Throng the Capitol to Hear
the Message

Washington, April 1.-THE president
| today sent the following message to
the congress of the United States:
Obedient to that precept of the con-
stitution which commands the president
to give from time to time to congress
| information regarding the state of the
| sideration such measures as he shall
| judge necessary and expedient, it be-
comes my duty now to address your
body with regard to the grave crisis
that has arisen in the relations of the
United States to Spain by reason of the
warfare that for more than three years
has ragged in the neighboring island of
Cuba.
do so because of the intimate con-
eection of the Cuban question with the
state of our own union and the grave
relation the course which is now in
cumbent upon the nation to adopt, must
needs bear to the traditional policy of
our government if it is to accord with
the precepts laid down by the founders
of the republic and religiously observed
by succeeding administrations to the
present day.
The present revolution is but the sue
cessor of other similar instructions,
which have occurred in Cuba against
the dominion of Spain, extending over
a period of nearly half a century, each
of which, during it's progress, has SUBJ
jected the United States to great effort
and expense in enforcing it's neutrality
laws, caused enormous losses to the
American trade and commerce, caused
irritation, annoyance and disturbance
among our citizens and by the exercise
of cruel, barbarous and uncivilized
practices of warfare, shocked the sem
sibilities and offended the humane SYM
pathies of our people.
Since the present revolution began. in
February, 1885, this country has seen
the fertile domain at our Threshold
ravaged by fire and sword in the
course of a struggle unequalled in the
history of the island and barely paral-
leled as to the number of the combat
ants and the bitterness of the contest
by any revolution OF modern times,
where dependent people striving to be
free have been opposed by the power of
the sovereign state.
Our people have beheld a once pros
porous community reduced to compare
tive. want. it's commerce virtually par
alyzed, it's exceptional productiveness
diminished, its fields laid waste,its mills
in ruin and its people perishing by tens
of thousands from hunger and destitu-
ton.
We have found ourselves constrained
in the observance of that strict neutral
itv which our laws enjoin and which the
law of nations commands, to police oura
own waters and watch our own SeapOrtS
in prevention of any unlawful act in aid
of the CubanS.
our trade has suffered; the capital
invested by our citizens in Cuba, has
been largely lost and the temper and
forbearance of our people have been
90 sorely tried as to beget a perilous
S|Drest among our own citizens, which
has inevitably found its expression
from time to time in the national legis-
Iature so that issues wholly external to
o11r own body polite engrosS attention
9nd stand in the way of that close de-
votion to domestic advancement that
hecoroes a Self-contented common
wealth whose primal maxim has been
the avoidance of all foreign entangle-
ments All this must needs awaken
and has indeed, aroused the utmost
concern on the part of this government
as we'll during my predecessors, as
my own.
our country suffered through the Cuban
war became so enormous that my pre-
decessor made an effort to bring about
peace through the mediation of this
tend to an honorable adjustment of
the contest between Spain and her re-