The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-10-02
Can the Cubans overn Themselves

From President PALMA's persistent
determination to resign his office, in spite
OF earnest remonstrances from President
ROOSEVELT and Secretary TAFT, the
inference has been drawn that he believes
il to be better for the welfare Of his ma
tive island that it should become a part
of the United States than that it should
be governed by the Liberals, who, al
though at present many, il not most, OF
their leaders are white, are VIGOROUSLY
backed by nearly the whole of the negroes
and mulattoes, and who therefore may
be expected TO drift under the control
of the colored race. II the inference be
well founded, and if there is ground for
the assumption imputed to President
PALMA that Liberal a~scendency in Cuba
would proven the end negro ascendency,
we must recognize hat underneath the
political question lies a racial n OF the
gravest kind.
It is a generally admitted result Of the
experiments made in the United States
during the Reconstruction period that
in States where negroes have possessed
DOtAllCdl ICDbiNNA uAAN C"hiS w NSNPN
riority of numbers or to an alliance with
a section of the whites they have shown
themselves incapable Of honest, ecOnom
zeal and just government. That this
conclusion was reached even by the mass
of Republicans at the North is evident
from the fact that in 1877 the Hayes
Administration Connived at the super
session of carpet bag governments by
governments which practically repre-
scented white citizens alone. From that
day TO this our Federal Government,
although except for eight years it has
been in the hands Of Republicans, has
refrained from any attempt to thwart
the devices by which in many Southern
States the negro has been virtually dis
franchised. That is the policy which
even the Republican party, which was
responsible for the blunders Of the Re-
construction period, has felt constrained
to follow in the interests Of civilization.
Can it follow any other policy in Cuba?
The proportion of colored to the white
population in that island is variously
computed. according to the rigor with
which census takers have insisted on
assigning all mulattOes, including quad
rooms and octOroons. to the COlOred race.
The pressure against the exercise of such
riCor is almost irresistible in Cuba, for
there, as we are told in the familiar
song:
Los negros quieren ser hlancos
Los mulatos caballeros"
Or, in plain prose, the blacks want to
be mistaken for whites; the mulattoes
for whites Of high degree. We are prob
ably well within the truth when we
that the colored race, including
mulattoes of all shades, represents in
Cuba about one-half of the population,
which we may put at 100000. The
proportion of negroes TO mulattOes is,
for the reason above given, not easily
estimated. There is no doubt, however,
that the former are much the more MI
merous and there is this further differ
ence to be noted, that while most Of the
mulattoes have received more or less
education almost all Of the pure blacks
are totally ~uneduCated. In the social
scale the latter have risen but little, il
any, higher than had the pure blacks in
Hayti at the time of the expulsion of the
whites from the French or western sec
ton of Hispaniola.
Were the pure blacks to become DOM
inant in Cuba there il good reason to fear
that the island, like Hayti, would relapse
rapidly into savagery. There would be
of course. an interval after the dislodge-
ment Of the whites from power during
which the more OF less educated mulat-
toes would try to keep up the pretencG
of a civilized administration, but if We
may Judge from the experience Of Hayt.
the interval would be brief. Mean,
while the whites, after fruitless attempts
10 maintain their sugar and tobacco in.
dustries, would have had to suffer the
decay and loss of their property, anC
ultimately, 20 save their lives, must have
had recourse to expatriation.
Up to 1902, when the United States
evacuated the island, the whites of Cuba
never had t o face the racial problem
because they always had at their back q
strong transmarine Power, able to fol
the intrigues Of the mulattoes and checl
the brute instincts Of the full bloodec
blacks. Gradually during the last foul
years the racial problem has revealed
itself in it's ugly and redoubtable reality
That the Moderates, who on the whOl'
NAV be described as a white mans party
doubted their ability to solve Lhe prob
Iapa with the strong hand may be in,
ferreu from their resort to fraud on al
extensive scale in last years election
That they virtually despaired Of putting
down the recent instruction seemi
evident from the fact that il was a
President PALMA's request that $50 ma
rines or sailors were landed by Com.
mander CoLwELL to guard the execu
tive palace. We do not say that tho
Moderates might not have succeeded il
upholding the Palma Administration haC
they been vigorously supported from tn,
outset by the bankers, merchants anC
plantation owners, most of whom arr
~Spaniards OF other foreigners. They