Citizenship for the Porto Ricans

Extract

An inexhaustible topic for political discussion in the Island of Porto Rico is that of citizenship. Every Porto Rican who occupies himself in the slightest degree with public affairs declares it as one of his chief grievances against our government, that it has failed to make the Porto Ricans citizens of the United States. Many features of the Spanish rule he recalls without regrets but he never fails to impress it upon you, especially if you are an American, that before 1898 he was a citizen of Spain, and that his representatives sat in the Spanish cortes. Republican United States he declares has been less generous to him than monarchical Spain. It seems to him a plain matter of justice that he should be made a citizen and he cannot understand the apathy of the United States towards the entire question, and least of all the active antagonism to his aspirations which appears when the matter is galvanized into life by executive recommendation or congressional proposal.