the Republican party wanted to avoid giving any chance. for people to call it imperialistic in the uncertain pre-presidential campaign situation of that time.40 A more likely reason for the American attitude, however, is the one that Zayas had had in mind in dismissing the Honest Cabinet,the fear of Washington that a strong stand might hurt the United States before the Pan-American Congress and in its general Hispanic American policy. On this score the following is a statement concerning Secretary of State Hughes and his policy that was made by a man of long experience in Hispanic America, to whose opinions the writer is inclined to subscribe:

"Hughes is so afraid that somebody may say that the United States acted improperly or in an imperialistic manner that he leans backwards, and in so doing does a lot of harm, here in Cuba at any rate. He does not realize that Hispanic American peoples respect strong actions, however much they may shout against them at the time, and that in any event their momentary outbursts pass away very quickly. In fact, no amount of gentle methods will do away with Hispanic American criticism, and it won't stop 'nationalistic' politicians, whose patriotism has a very definite relation to their own personal fortunes. In Cuba, Hughes did not back up Crowder when Zayas kicked over the traces in 1923. So Zayas has not only been enabled to pose as the savior of Cuban liberties, but has also been virtually defended in the most stupendous campaign of graft I have ever witnessed, because Hughes will not let the Cubans have a revolution or will not take the responsibility of stopping these evils himself. As I see it, he ought to do one or the other, even at the cost of a revolution, which would indeed be a terrible calamity. Better still, no doubt, would be for him to have the moral courage to undertake and see through a program of reform such as all decent Cubans want, irrespective of what anybody might say, Cubans, Hispanic Americans, or Democrats in the United States, since there is no real danger in such a policy and since it is based on right principles."

abortive revolution against Zayas, which was doomed to failure when the United States followed its recently developed policy of backing the government in power.

Zayas did indeed make all the political capital he could out of having "saved" the country, and kept singing the same tune to the end of his administration. To be sure, to the understanding ear it was in a weird key. Some go so far as to assert that the cry of Cuban "nationalism" was first suggested in New York,-by American financial interests which hoped to enhance their own profits through lining Zayas's pockets with American dollars in return for improper concessions, if Crowder were out of the way. It is doubtful whether there was any such precise arrangement, but it would have been conceivable with a man like Zayas. A generalization by Spinden so aptly covers his case that the subject may be dismissed by quoting it:

"Patriotism is the last resort of scoundrels. We may rest assured that the vociferous spoilers in Cuba will not neglect the proper phrases to hide their evil designs. The ordinary man in the streets . . . will grin and bear it, and national pride will be invoked to make him turn against the United States as somehow deeply to blame. That is part of the price we must pay to achieve real leadership in moral things."

One more statement may be quoted, this time with respect to the other of the two most prominent actors in this period, General Crowder.

"You can't help feeling proud of the general for what he tried to do in Cuba, but he may have made a mistake in insisting on the loan. There would have been chaos without it, but that might have hastened some effective reform that would help to eradicate the graft that is eating at the heart of the republic now."

Was it a mistake? Who can say? If it was, who can deny that it was an honest and generous one? And was there. any good reason why his achievements should have been surrendered so easily? 43

Spinden, Herbert Joseph, America and her duty in Cuba, in Boston Transcript, Aug. 7, 1923.

For some comment on authorities for the Zayas period, see note at the end of chapter XX.

CHAPTER XIX

CORRUPTION AND REMONSTRANCE

1923-1924

WITH United States help, offered through the medium of General Crowder's services, Cuba had had a chance to become the model republic of Hispanic America, if the pace could have been maintained. Zayas gave the moralization program such a setback, however, that except as an example all of the work was lost. Indeed, the last two years of the Zayas rule were so utterly depraved that a beginning would have to be made from a point farther back than at the time he took office in 1921. To be sure, in some respects the situation was better in 1925. The country was not nearly in such a bad way financially, though the prospects of sugar were none too flattering. And there was a peaceful succession to the presidency. In neither case, however, was Zayas entitled to any particular credit. As has already been pointed out, Cuban prosperity is dependent on factors quite outside of government, which may hinder progress but cannot produce it. And Zayas gave up the presidency only when it was clear to him that he could not reëlect himself, not even with the employment of the methods of 1916 and 1920. The one merit accruing to him is that he recognized this fact, and yielded to the inevitable. It may be interesting at this point to give some opinions of Zayas, set forth in the light of his conduct down to the summer of 1924. The following are a few sample statements, includ

ing one that is ultra-favorable, but not altogether out of line with the others:

..

(1) "People do not understand Zayas, who is really a great man. To be sure, he has not been perfect. You can't defend the Santa Clara purchase or his nepotism. And everything they say about . . . ! ! . . . is true. All else about Zayas is good. He is an idealist, and admires Lincoln above any man in history, possessing an unusually rich library on his life. Everybody knows he is no fool, and, above all, he has remarkable patience. He has a perfect passion for freedom of speech, and in the face of insult he calmly bides his time. He has often been urged to suspend certain newspapers that attack him or to exile a vociferous opponent, but he refuses to do so, insisting that the way to get rid of license in expression is to let it run its course. He believes in Cuba for the Cubans, and in time to come will be regarded as the greatest man the country has produced."

(2) “If it is true that Zayas has made a study of the life of Lincoln it was only to learn how to do the opposite!"

(3) "Zayas has been Cuba's worst ruler since the separation from Spain. He has been the worst nepotist and the worst grafter. He has made many improvements on paper,-almost none at all in fact. He will get a bill put through for a road, have some engineer relative draw up a plan, pay him half a million, and nothing more will be done,except for the division of the spoil. The more than thirty millions he has accumulated in the treasury are all a false appearance. He has them, through not paying the floating debt, but he himself is far more likely to get a lot of this money than ever the creditors are to receive a cent."

(4) "Zayas is not ashamed to rake in pesetas if he can't get pesost Worse than his own graft, however, is the way he lets his relatives ride. Worse yet is that his wife's relatives are feeding at the public crib, too."

(5) "Zayas's 'nationalism' is only a farce. Of course, it is a useful cry in practical politics, but at the very time that he was shouting loudest about 'Cuba for the Cubans' he was making deals with great corporations so as to give excessive privileges in Cuba to foreigners. Some people praise him for stepping down from the presidency, instead of reëlecting himself by force, but he knew perfectly well that there would be a real revolution if he intended to inflict himself on Cuba again and that the army would be on the other side. So he made the best arrangement he could, to keep himself and his relatives out of jail."

'The peseta has a normal value of dollar.

twenty cents, and the peso of a

It would be easy to accumulate thousands of Zayas items from newspapers and other Cuban sources, but they would not differ appreciably from the above. A few such statements are referred to later, in connection with the events of these years. It happens, too, that several carefully thought-out articles have appeared in United States periodicals dealing with Zayas. In September 1925 there was a series of articles by Albert Whiting Fox in the Washington Post about the evil conditions that were causing what seemed almost like a national uprising against Zayas at that time. In November 1923 Edward L. Conn had a similar series of articles in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, with an even more detailed survey of Zayas's conduct and other iniquities in Cuban political life. More recently other estimates of the Zayas government have appeared. The following recites one characteristic instance of the President's procedure:

"On taking over the presidency, Dr. Zayas found that in the budget he was allowed about three hundred thousand dollars annually for the Executive Department of the government. Repeatedly he appealed to Congress to increase this amount by $180,000, threatening, if his wishes were not respected, to close the palace and return to his home at Morro No. 3. Congress . turned a deaf ear to his distress. He then appealed for aid to his Cabinet, . . and one of them, Capt. Castillo Pokorny, an honor graduate of West Point, suggested that, if Dr. Zayas found himself unable to live within his allotment, it would be a fitting recognition of the straits in which the country found itself if the President were to close the palace and discharge the hordes of servants who were proving so costly. Current bills for supplies at the palace were unpaid, and eventually came before the debt commission, together with thousands of unpaid accounts left over from Menocal's administration. Among these bills were some for hundreds of dollars' worth of perfume, one for eight hundred dollars' worth of eggs,—one month's consumption of the presidential family, others of ten and twenty thousand dollars for pheasants and roses. Balked by both Congress and the Cabinet, Dr. Zayas pondered deeply and shortly evolved a wonderful new scheme. With the help of Erasmos Regue