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"although," wrote the American minister, "the Cortes have been in session for a month, the Cuban question has not been considered, nor even mentioned, otherwise than incidentally in the public sittings. With every mail from Havana the announcement is repeated that the insurrection is suppressed, yet the embarkation of re-enforcements continues. The consul at Cadiz reports the departure of 1,428 troops since the middle of October." On November 8 the colonial minister declared in the Cortes "that the government would not bring forward any measure of reform for Cuba until the last hostile band was dispersed and the insurgents had lost all hope." Spain, he said again, "is in the position of a man of honor who does not yield what is asked of him by an armed adversary. The first thing is to conquer; if possible, bloodlessly; but if this be impossible, the right of force and the force of right will decide."3

"2

On November 21, however, a project for reforms in Puerto Rico was brought forward, indicating what might be done for Cuba. This included local self-government, modified liberty of the press and of public discussion and association, the establishment of public schools, impartial suffrage, gradual but speedy abolition of slavery, civil and political rights without distinction of color, and right of domiciled foreigners to vote for town officials after six months' and for members of the provisional council after one year's residence. The American minister was assured that these reforms would be extended to Cuba when hostilities should cease and deputies should be chosen in compliance with the constitution.* A marked sign of the changed attitude in Spain was the appearance in the Diario, of Barcelona, of its conclusion that "in our judgment no other resource remains to us but to open negotiations with the United States for the cession to them of our Antilles," a remark copied into the popular organ in Havana of the volunteers, the Voz de Cuba, of September 20, 1869, the latter a fact in itself indicative of the new possibilities.

There can be little doubt that adjustment was almost within reach. The action of the British government in directing its

1 General Sickles to Mr. Fish, November 3, 1869, House Ex. Doc., 160, 41 Cong., 2 Sess., 60.

"Ibid., 60.

3

Ibid., 162.

4

Ibid., 162-164.

304

A GREAT OPPORTUNITY LOST

[1869

ambassador at Madrid, Mr. Layard, to second the American minister in his suggestions to the Spanish government in regard to the abolition of slavery, came to add weight to the American proposals.1

In reply to General Sickles's announcement of this support, Mr. Fish wrote: "It becomes more apparent every day that this contest cannot terminate without the abolition of slavery. This government regards the government at Madrid as committed to that result," and the American minister was directed to state that it was expected, if it should appear that the insurrection was regarded as suppressed, as had been frequently stated, that such steps would be taken.2

But the great opportunity which promised so fair was lost; the Spanish proviso of antecedent peace called for the impossible. Had the acceptance of the good offices of the United States been continued, had the government of the latter been given at this moment opportunity to act as a mediator, there would have been possibility of the accomplishment of what the more influential of the men in power in Spain were undoubtedly desirous of bringing about. Had the insurgents refused such mediation, they would have lost the American sympathy, which was so strong an element in heartening the insurgent party in continuing the struggle. Had Spain been willing to proceed upon the basis of an armistice, and had such offer been accepted by the insurgents, and had Spain thereupon not carried out the intentions which were to serve as the base of American action, such failure would have been just cause for the United States to intervene forcibly in the contest. The resolution, announced November 8 by the colonial minister, to first conquer a peace was fatal. It was a declaration of war for nine more years.

The fundamental difficulty was in the state of Spain itself. At the end of 1869 the country "found itself a kingdom without a king, with a nerveless regency, an effete Cortes, a constitution disregarded, a ministry divided against itself, an empty treasury, and a population irritated to the point of fury. . . . More conscripts

1 General Sickles to Mr. Fish, December 29, 1869, House Doc. 160, 41 Cong., 2 Sess., 67.

Mr. Fish to General Sickles, January 26, 1870, Ibid., 69.

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were needed, and fresh risings took place against the blood tax; powers of suppression were hurriedly granted by the Cortes which practically suspended the constitution; murder, pillage, anarchy, and national decay had reached their apogee in the spring of 1870, when the question of the monarch had to be settled," as it was soon to be by the choice of the Italian Prince Amadeo; a choice for which Prim's life was to be the forfeit.2

1 Hume, 480.

1

2 Amadeo was elected king November 16, 1870, by a vote of 191 out of 311, a majority of 71 of the members present. The whole number of deputies was 344. Besides the 33 absent, 19, of whom 12 were Carlists, voted blank, 63 voted for a republic, 27 for the Duke of Montpensier, and the rest scattering. It appears, therefore, that of the 229 votes cast for candidates for the throne, the Italian prince received 84 per cent. (General Sickles to Mr. Fish, November 19, 1870, Foreign Relations, 1871, 731.)

CHAPTER XVI

THE FIRM AND CORRECT STAND OF GENERAL GRANT'S ADMINISTRATION. THE "VIRGINIUS"

By this time Spain had available in Cuba, if the 40,000 volunteers doing garrison duty be included, over 100,000 men; 34,000 had been sent from Spain since the beginning of November, 1868. Of the total force but 7,500 were cavalry, the only arm which could be of real value in such warfare.

Throughout this and the final contest, Spain's great error was in sending to the island vast bodies of infantry, which were wholly ineffective against a mounted enemy such as the Cubans were. Amazing as was her energy in the transport and support of such great masses of troops, equally amazing was its misdirection. There were fourteen men-of-war on the station, including two iron-clads, besides the small gun-boats built and building in the United States. The whole was an astonishing exhibition of effort on the part of a country torn by internal dissensions and with credit at the lowest ebb.

The brutal conduct of officials in Cuba, their disregard of the treaty of 1795, the refusal of Mr. Fish to consent to the issue of a proclamation of recognition of the Cuban rebels as constituting a belligerent government, and the arrest of military enterprises destined for Cuba, created great emotion in Congress and throughout the country. Mr. Fish wrote to General Sickles mentioning the manner in which hostile action against Spanish sovereignty over Cuba had been resisted by the administration, "against a strong sympathetic pressure from without," a pressure so strong that there was a brief time in August, 1870, when the President contemplated the granting of belligerent rights, and had even caused a

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proclamation to be prepared which he signed and left with Mr. Fish, but which the latter did not issue.1

If one may make a safe inference from the notes of Mr. Fish that have been published by Congress, it was his desire and purpose to keep the Alabama negotiation and the Cuban difficulties out of the hands of Congress and in his own control, subject, of course, to the orders of the President. In that he was successful, but the emotions in Congress and in the country over the coming seizure of the Virginius, and the massacre of many of her crew and passengers, nearly forced his hand.

The President's first annual message, December, 1869, had dealt very shortly with Cuban affairs. Though himself in strong personal sympathy with the aspirations of the insurgents, so much so, in fact, that but for the determined attitude of Mr. Fish he would have yielded to the pressure of those in Congress who had his confidence, and who were eager for action against Spain, he had said in his message, "the contest has at no time assumed the conditions which amount to war in the sense of international law, or which would show the existence of a de facto political organization of the insurgents sufficient to justify a recognition of belligerency." Notwithstanding, on January 31, 1870, a joint resolution, granting the insurgents belligerent rights, was introduced in the House by Mr. Fitch, and on February 11 in the Senate by Mr. John Sherman."

The President's sympathies were well known, and the character of the special message on the subject sent to Congress June 13, 1870, must have come with a certain shock of surprise to the

1 Senate Ex. Doc., 108, 41 Cong., 2 Sess., 245; Foreign Relations, 1871, 697; Moore, International Arbitrations, II, 1033 (note); The Atlantic Monthly, February, 1894; Adams, Lee at Appomattox, and Other Papers, 117-123; Rhodes, United States, VI, 345.

'Mr. Sherman's move was taken with an inconsiderateness unhappily not unusual in our congressional action, and was a forecast of his attitude twentyseven years later. He was not, in 1870, even aware of the existence of the treaty with Spain, of 1795, and under it, of the necessary consequences of his action if carried through. He admitted that he had not examined the subject closely, and was advised by Mr. Fish, "in connection with the passing of his resolution, to prepare bills for the increase of the public debt and to meet the increased appropriation which [would] be necessary for the army, navy, etc. (Mr. Fish's Private Journal, February 19, 1870; John Bassett Moore, in the Forum, May, 1896, 295.)