The record-union., 1899-12-24
Cuba Under American Rule.

The only real danger which the most
anxious American has been able to dis
Germ in the extension of American SOW
ereignty over new lands and alien peo-
pies lies in the fear of misgovernment.
in the replacing of Spanish boodlers and
political heelers by American boodlers
and heelers, to the lasting disgrace OF
the nation before the world, the intol-
cradle misery of the population under
them and the undoubted, unfavorable
reaction upon the people of the United
States. The problem is, confessedly, a
difficult one; and it is the more diff
cult, to use "a paradox, because the
manner of solution is perfectly we'll
known to students Of colonial queS-
lions and to the practical administra-
tors of the world. Great Britain and
Holland have absolutely learned the
proper means of dealing with colonial
questions and all the world knows what
the practical results have been.
1t is simple matter. In the first
place. the men who undertake to gov
ern the people of Cuba, Porto Rico and
the Philippines must be in sympathy
with them. They must know their Ian
guage, their customs, domestic and
other, their laws, their religious pre-
objections and scruples, themselves.
They must deal with the natives at
first hand and it must be their con-
slant endeavor to help the natives by
inducing them to help themselves. To
do all this they must be men of supe-
rior attachments.
Superior attainments is hard phrase
for common people to grasp. The Off
GERS of our army and navy are men of
superior attainments. So, generally
speaking, are our Cabinet officers. In
the case of the army and navy it means
that they have first studied at either
the United States Military Academy at
West Point or the United States Naval
Academy at Annapolis, and there been
given an education which is rather
more than equivalent to good col
legiate education-more than equivalent
in the mere matter of actual learning
assimilated-and superior, as a train
ing, because it is directed so largely to-
ward the bringing out of character
Each step in advance along the line of
promotion after leaving the academy
has to be met with a. farther examina-
ton, so that the intellectual equipment
of Rear Admiral in the navy or a
Brigadier General in the army is fully
equivalent to that implied in the earn
ing of electorate in philosophy from
one of the leading universities of the
world. The training is, of course, spe-
officially military.
A recently published book, 1.-THE New
Born Cuba,'' by Franklin Matthews,
shows what it is that these men, Off
GERS OF the regular establishment with
the rank of General have been able to
accomplish in the island of Cuba during
the first sixty days of American occu-
pancy there. The result is one which
must cheer every patriotic heart. With
in two months the abuses of centuries
under Spanish misrule were swept
away-never, it is hoped, to return.
But there is more in the civil admin
istration of Cuba than cleaning the
cities, insuring the prompt delivery of
letters, making the custom houses hon
est instead of being mere dens of
thieves and securing the people of the
islands from brigandage, great as all
these things are, and mighty as have
been the efforts needed to accomplish
them. 1t is a familiar fact that it takes
raise 1t. The military men have raised
the burden from the backs of the Gu
ban people; but it is not their duty to
keep 1t from returning, once their pre-
liminary labors of pacification are end
ed Inc training of the soldier is for
war; not for peace. except at the end of
successful war. He is taught to obey
and command, but he is not taught to
sympathize with foreign peoples-in-
deed, his necessary equipment of zeal
Gus and unquestioning patriotism is of
another sort.
After the army officer in Cuba must
come the civil administrator. He must
be as good as the best civil administra-
tors IN the world, the British and the
Dutch. He must be as much above the
average man as is the Admiral of the
navy or the General in the army, and
his training must be as specifically to-