American medical men labored with a martyr's devotion to stamp out disease.General Wood, as military governor, established order and justice and presided over the evolution of a convention assembled to draft a constitution for the people of Cuba and to determine the relations of the United States and Cuba.These relations, indeed, were already under consideration at Washington and were subsequently embodied in the Platt Amendment.* This measure directed the President to leave the control of Cuba to the people of the island as soon as they should agree to its terms.It also required that the Government of Cuba should never allow a foreign power to impair its independence; that it would contract no debt for which it could not provide a sinking fund from the ordinary revenue; that it would grant to the United States "lands necessary for coaling or naval stations"; that it would provide for the sanitation of its cities; and that the United States should have the right to intervene, "for the preservation of Cuban independence, the maintenance of a government adequate for the protection of life, property, and individual liberty, and for discharging" certain obligations with respect to Spanish subjects which the United States had assumed in the treaty signed at Paris.After some hesitation the convention added these provisions to the new constitution of Cuba.On May 20, 1902, the American troops withdrew, leaving Cuba in better condition than she had ever been before.Subsequently the United States was forced to intervene to preserve order, but, though the temptation was strong to remain, the American troops again withdrew after they had done their constructive work.The voluntary entrance of Cuba into the Great War in cooperation with the United States was a tribute to the generosity and honesty of the American people.
* An amendment to the Army Appropriation Bill of March 2, 1901.
Porto Rico presented a problem different from that which the United States had to solve in Cuba.There existed no native organization which could supply even the basis for the formation of a government.The people seemed, indeed, to have no desire for independence, and public sentiment in the United States generally favored the permanent possession of the island.After a period of rule entirely at the discretion of the President, Congress established in 1900 a form of government based on that of the American territories.Porto Rico remained, however, unincorporated into the Union, and it was long doubtful whether it would remain a dependency or would ultimately attain statehood.In 1917, however, the degree of self-government was increased, and the inhabitants were made American citizens.It now seems probable that the island will ultimately become a State of the Union.
Meanwhile on the other side of the world the United States had a more unpleasant task.The revolted Filipinos, unlike the Cubans, had not declared themselves for independence but for redress of grievances.The United States had assisted Aguinaldo, at the moment in exile, to return to the islands after the Battle of Manila Bay but had not officially recognized him as having authority.When he saw Spanish power disappearing under American blows, he declared himself in favor of the abolition of all foreign rule.This declaration, of course, in no way bound the United States, to whom the treaty with Spain, the only recognized sovereign, ceded the island absolutely.There was no flaw in the title of the United States, and there were no obligations, save those of humanity, to bind the Americans in their treatment of the natives.Nevertheless, the great majority of Americans would doubtless have gladly favored a policy similar to that pursued in the case of Cuba, had it seemed in any way practicable.
Unfortunately, however, the Filipinos did not constitute a nation but only a congeries of peoples and tribes of differing race and origin, whom nearly four centuries of Spanish rule had not been able to make live at peace with one another.Some were Christians, some Mohammedans, some heathen savages; some wore European clothes, some none at all.The particular tribe which formed the chief support of Aguinaldo, the Tagalogs, comprised less than one half of the population of the island of Luzon.The United States had taken the islands largely because it did not see any one else to whom it could properly shift the burden.The shoulders of the Tagalogs did not seem broad enough for the responsibility.
The United States prepared, therefore, to carry on the task which it had assumed, while Aguinaldo, with his army circling Manila, prepared to dispute its title.On February 4, 1899, actual hostilities broke out.By this time Aguinaldo had a capital at Malolos, thirty miles north of Manila, a government, thirty or forty thousand troops, and an influence which he was extending throughout the islands by means of secret organizations and superstitious appeals.This seemed a puny strength to put forth against the United States but various circumstances combined to make the contest less unequal than it seemed, and the outcome was probably more in doubt than that in the war with Spain.
