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Vol. 68

The Outlook

Published Weekly

May 4, 1901

The visit of repThe Cubans at Washington resentatives of the Cuban Constitutional Convention to Washington for the purpose of discussing with the President and Secretary Root the true meaning and purpose of the Platt amendment has, according to all reports, resulted in a more friendly understanding between the representatives of the two nations than before existed. Naturally, no reports of the discussions have been given to the public, but there are many indications that both Cubans and Americans have been pleased, and that the visit may be regarded as likely to be a positive factor in the permanent settlement of the Cuban question. Somewhat to the Somewhat to the surprise of most people in this country,

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retary of War seems to have been to convince the visitors that there was no underlying and secret intention behind the propositions made in the Platt amendment; that the word

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ially," in the proviso that the can establish independence in y after the conditions of the endment have been substanepted, cannot be interpreted that the amendment may be 1 or radically changed; that the and purpose of our Government ily and positively to establish and Cuban independence. It is freely the press, although, of course, ', that the effect of the arguments efore the Cuban Commissioners such that they will upon their

ocate the adoption of the Platt amendments with slight modification, and that they will expect in return that the Administration will place before Congress some kind of proposition looking toward a reasonable degree of reciprocity between Cuba and the United States. Congress alone can act on the most important question of tariff regulation, and Congress alone can do anything to modify essentially the present offer made to Cuba. General Betancourt, in an interview, carefully abstained from committing himself

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and his..fellow Commissioners, but admitted that the visit, had; produced upon them an agreeable impression, and that there had been an earnest effort on both sides to deal with the subject in such a spirit of fairness and honor as would reach a conclusion satisfactory to all concerned. This interview may be supplemented with one held when the Commission first arrived in this country with Señor Portuando, of the Commission, who said:

Ninety-nine per cent. of the Cuban people desire absolute independence. It is their wish that the military occupation by the United States come to an end at once. It may be said that a small element of Span iards, from a purely commercial motive-I should not say over ten thousand-would favor annexation, but the wish for independence is felt generally by many Cubans and Spaniards alike. Those Spaniards who favor annexation are not impelled by any love for the United States. They hate us, and they seem to wish some sort of guarantee as to their property and business interests. Peace with the Americans without the independence of Cuba is impossible—I mean moral peace. I do not mean to say that in the event that independence is not granted war or revolution would follow, but that there would be no sympathy, no friendliness, between the peoples.

Encouraging eviProgress in the Philippines dence continues to come from the Philippines indicating that the people are beginning to appreciate the efforts for local self-government which the Taft Commission, under its general instructions from Washington, is laboring earnestly to establish. Particularly interesting is the full account recently received in this country of what is being done in educational matters. Mr. Atkinson, Superintendent of Education, has already engaged for the schools in the islands over two hundred teachers of English, and in the number are included at least twenty men who have been State Superintendents of Schools, Superintendents of State Normal Schools, professors in well-known universities, or have held other positions which guarantee their experience and educational abilities. In all a thousand teachers will be engaged, and a million dollars will be spent within the next year in payment of teachers, transportation of teachers to the islands, building of schools, and furnishing of text-books and school supplies; of the latter twenty freight-car

loads have been ordered. It is reported that there are now fifteen hundred schools in the archipelago, and that the natives have manifested the very liveliest interest in the establishing of the schools. A letter to the New York " Evening Post " gives a picturesque account of the public sessions of the Commission at Bulacan, the capital of the Province of the same name. This has been one of the most warlike of the provinces, and the scenes which took place after the Commission had made the people understand its intentions with regard to local self-government are described as dramatic and almost excessive in the sentiment and hope for the future expressed by former insurgent leaders such as General Flores. Several important Filipino leaders still remain in the field, however; of these General Cailles is one of the most active, and last week it was reported that his camp had been burned by the Americans for the tenth time; as usual, the Filipino General succeeded in evading capture. The trial of Captain Read, charged with being implicated in the commissary scandal, has just begun. Sixto Lopez, the unofficial representative of the Filipinos in this country, whose recent article in The Outlook will be remembered, is about to return to his native country. He says that while he still believes that ninety-five per cent. of the natives will never be satisfied with anything less than full independence, he is returning to find out the exact condition of affairs, and if he learns that Aguinaldo is correct in stating that the majority of the natives now desire peace immediately, he will aid in establishing good relations between the Americans and the Filipinos.

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for "infamous crime." The spirit of this pledge, we are glad to report, called forth a strong protest from one of the leading ministers of the State-the Rev. Edgar Gardner Murphy, of Montgomery-who published a letter to the Chairman of the Democratic State Committee, proving that the discrimination against the negroes was unconstitutional, unnecessary, and harmful to whites as well as blacks. He himself does not believe in the amendment to the Federal Constitution enfranchising the negro, but he pointed out that every loyal citizen was bound to obey the provisions of this amendment until it was repealed and repeal was impossible. The Federal Courts would be obliged to overthrow any State enactment debarring men of the suffrage because of race or previous condition of servitude. In the next place, Mr. Murphy showed that the making of illiteracy on the part of a negro the equivalent of "infamous crime" on the part of a white was absolutely unnecessary to insure white supremacy. The white voters were already supreme in every single county in the State, and the fear of negro domination was no longer even an imaginable bogy. In the third place, he pleaded that needless discrimination against the negroes would injure them less than the whites. Just now the truth of this position may not be demonstrable, but no one who has studied the moral lessons of history has failed to note that, while evils are often overruled for the good of those who suffer them, they never fail to react for evil upon those from whom they come. The Outlook is wholly out of sympathy with political efforts to estrange Southern negroes from Southern whites, but it fears that the coming Constitutional Convention in Alabama will give new life to the race issue which it seeks to bury.

Reforms Advanced in Minnesota

will be still further broadened so that State officers as well as Congressional, county, and city officers shall be directly nominated by the people. The practicability of nominating State officers in this way has already been demonstrated in South Carolina and Georgia. But the direct primary law was not the only reform measure accepted by the Legislature. An inheritance tax modeled after that in force in New York State has been made a part of the financial system of the State. The New York system, it will be recalled, places no tax on direct inheritance of real estate, and none on personal estates of less than ten thousand dollars. A third important reform was the introduction of the Torrens land transfer system into the Minnesota counties containing the three large cities. This system, it will be remembered, has already been introduced in Illinois and in Massachusetts. Under its operation the owner of real estate, by paying a fee of one-tenth of one per cent. of its assessed value, may have his title confirmed by the court, and receive a registration certificate which guarantees it and makes his realty as easily transferred as the stock of a corporation. In addition to these measures, the Legislature increased the tax on the gross receipts of railroads from three to four per cent., and appointed a tax commission to report upon the thorough reform of the tax laws. uniform tax on gross receipts has never seemed to us a just method of taxing railroads, partly because it is unfair to new roads which barely pay operating expenses, but chiefly because the general public does not realize that on the more profitable railroads four per cent. on the gross receipts is barely one-half of one per cent. on the value of the property. Nevertheless, the recent increase in the rate makes the tax on railroads in Minnesota approach more nearly to the taxation exacted from individual propertyowners, and therefore makes easier the introduction of a system under which corporate property and individual property are taxed alike.

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The Minnesota Legislature which recently adjourned seems to have made an unusually good record. Its most important accomplishment, of course, was the extension of the direct primary system from the one county in which it At the very The New York and New Jersey close of the had been tried to the entire State. GovBridge Bill ernor Van Sant, who gave his hearty session a bill support to this reform measure, expresses was suddenly presented to the New York his faith that in the near future the law Legislature, and rushed through both

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