The Irish standard., 1905-07-01
AMERICAN PERIL" IN CUBA

AMERICAN PERIL" IN CUBA
Dissatisfaction With Conditions as
They Now Exist.
Wardon Allan Curtis, writing to the
Boston Transcript from Havana, says:
To-day in Cuba the American peril
is the one most important thought in
the public mind. Not the most i'm.
portant topic in the public mouth, in
the public press, but certainly the
most important thought in the public
mind. Twice in the month of April
did members of the Cuban congress
bring the matter to the fore, to be
tremblingly warned to be careful. The
poor Cubans are not only afraid of
us, but afraid to let us know they are
afraid Of us. The opposition to Pres
ident Palma is principally due to the
fact that he is believed to have sur
rendered the country to the Ameri-
cans. The American peril has both
sentimental and an economic side.
Hundreds of Spanish proprietors of
sugar plantations and immense tracts
OF wild lands have gone back to Spain.
Much Of their property passed into
American hands, and the Americans
are trying to secure the passage of a
law that will throw much OF the re-
mainder to them. The one-time sugar
baron with his thousand retainers,
sees an American reign in his stead.
1t would not be human nature, cer-
tainly not proud and sensitive Span
ish nature, to contemplate this with
composure. The Havana hotels, once
filled with rich planters and their fam
lilies, enjoying the delights of the cap
ital, now have scarcely an Hispanian
patron. To the Spaniard, with his air
of ownership and being of the ruling
race, has succeeded the American.
The Cuban sees American capitalists
buying the cultivated lands.
In the American agricultural colo
MES, English schools are maintained,
sometimes in defiance of Cuban laws.
True it is that at present the Ameri-
! can children have shown the same
tendency toward Cubanization that
foreign children in our country show
toward Americanization. Even in the
Hrrln
numerous, the children who attend
Spanish-speaking schools come home
talking Spanish much to the chagrn
OF their parents. Hence the English
| speaking schools and the conflicts
! with Cuban school authorities. Pur-
chase OF plantations by Americans
who will actually reside on their land
is not the greatest grievance the
Cubans have. 1t is to plantations
managed by an agent for capitalist
or syndicate, that they object. They
do not wish to see their country meet
the fate OF Ireland, experience the
evils OF absentee landlordism. The
American trusts are here. To be sure,
they are everywhere, but that does
not alter the fact that they were not
here in the time of Spain, that they
came in the wake of the American
army. That Americans suffer from
them at home does not alleviate the
feelings Of the Cubans. They were
not here before Americans came, they
are here now Mr.. Rockefeller is here
Oil is a dollar Il gallon. Mr. Have
myer is here. Sugar in the greatest
sugar country of the world is eleven
cents pound! Mr.. Armour is here,
and his agent is under arrest for sell
ing bogus butter.
The nation is making one attempt
to counteract the American invasion" 4"
says Mr. Curtis. at is trying to fill
the country up with Spaniards so
there will be no room for Americans.
Its consuls travel all over Spain stim-
ulating immigration. In the last six
months OF 1905, over fifteen thousand
Spaniards arrived. The first three
months of this year saw the rate
raised to over three thousand a month.
AS l have said, President Palma is
looked upon by the Cuba for the
Cubans' party as lacking in strong
feeling Of nationality. His children
1had to learn Spanish after their ar
rival here. An American governess
is employed in the family, the three
younger children go to private Eng:
disappearing school in Havana, the
three elder children are all at school
in the United States, one at Cornell.
$50 the American peril looms. So
| the reaching across the Caribbean to
Venezuela, so the silent appeal to
Mexico and Diaz's manifesto to the
effect that the protection of Latin
America belongs to Latin America it,
sctt as we'll as to the United States.
So the new union of New Spain, new
pride of race and new yearning for
the old land shown in the movement
fer universal celebration of Cervan-
tes' tercentenary. So the oft expressed
regre, that Spain could not have ruled
Justly and we'll. So the shrugs of the
shoulders when word comes that in
Porto Rico-still called La 1sla Her