The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-05-10


what An EssIish Wsshly Thinks Of the
Attitude 81 ire Usiss1 states.
From the London Weekly Graphic.
The determination Of the United
States to expei Spain from Cuba has
not been arrived at with any undue
precipitation Indeed, II ever the in
PREVENTION Of state in h Affairs Of
another was justified. II is so In the
case Of the United States and Cubs
People on this side Of the Atlantic are
so little In touch with the historical
side Of the Cuban question. and are 80
deeply interested In Its more immediate
aspects. that they form but an imper-
feet image of the real and terrible
provocation suffered by h United
States.
1t IL scarcely an exaggeration to say
that Il ID Q piece Of Armenia dropped
into the New World. While all around
1t liberty nourishes. while II has seen
win their Independence. and the Brit
ish colonies In the same hemisphere
granted the fullest rights OF self-gov-
erning communities, II has been con-
demned to an administration little
short of medieval. Like the pashas Of
their positions by bribery and repay
themselves by extortion. Except 10
drain it Of It's wealth the mother coun-
try does little for II. Scarcely Q tenth
of the area OF the island 10 under cul-
tivation. and many districts are actual
ly less explored than the wilds Of Gen.
trail Africa. Until . few years ago 1t
was governed by decree. a It's gov-
ernors were invested with authority
which they rarely failed to use oppres-
sively, and which generally they APP
piled with revolving cruelty.
The vnhalItnus xrh;Oh houn thvo hnon
forced on the maddened natives
whites n blacks alike-have been re-
pressed with q disregard for human life
and amid horrors which many a sultan
might envy. During the first ffve years
Of the last rebellion under Cespedes
$500 prisoners in addition to 1875
Cubans killed in battle. That was the
period of Valmaceda's bloody admins
tration-scarcely more than 20 years
ago-when h whole world cried shame
on the Spaniards. Cruelties of this kind
naturally beget reprisals. and hence the
mode of warfare to-day il on both sides
little short Of savagery. Eighty thous-
and men persisted fighting In the 1865
rs rebellion, and during the civil war
of the last three years over 100, 900 lives
have been sacrificed to this Cuban Mo-
loch. What European state would toll
crate a condition of things like this at
its own doors?
Since 1S49 the United States has been
uninteruptedly occupied in policing the
coast of Florida in order to prevent fl
clustering expeditions leaving for
Cuba During the whole of that period
she has been plagued in various irri-
tating ways by the disorders in the ISL
and-strained relations with Spain, dip
lomatic difficulties with other powers.
excitement among her own population.
injuries to trade. and so forth. She
has now determined to get rid of the
nuisance. She has resolved to give
peace to the island once and for all.
Striking at the root of all the trouble,
she has called upon the Spanish gov
eminent to yield up the colony it has
SO unworthily administered No one
can blame her, n many will applaud
her. Military glory Is not to be won
by beating Spain, and II Is not for that
or even for an extension of her do
minion that the United States will
fight. Her object is to give peace and
a stable government to a spot on the
earth's surface which has scarcely
known either the n or the other
throughout it's history. If wars are tc
be waged at all they could not be un'
dertaken in a better cause.