President; that all acts of the council should be subject to the veto power of the governor and to be passed over the veto by a two-thirds vote, and no law should take effect until it has remained without disapproval for thirty days after presentation to Congress or to the President of the United States, if passed when Congress is not in session; that there should be a supreme court of the island, composed of judges appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate and having appellate jurisdiction only; trial courts in separate districts, having general original jurisdiction, with judges and officers to be appointed by the governor, and a petty court in each municipality; that the several municipalities now existing in the island, with such consolidations and alterations of boundaries as the council shall prescribe, shall be governed by mayors and municipal councils, to be elected by the people of the municipalities, each municipality to be free from control in the exercise of the powers of local government, except as it shall be controlled by statute, and except as its officers shall be liable to removal by the governor in case of failure to faithfully perform their duties, and with power in the gov ernor in case of such failure to order a new election and to fill vacancies in the meantime.

Such a system as this is not without precedent in our own expcrience, for the provision of a governor and council was frequently adopted in our early territorial legislation. It would give to the people of the island participation in the government, and would afford them an opportunity both to acquire and to demonstrate capacity for the conduct of government.

The question whether there might not now be provision made for a legislature elected by the people of the island is not free from doubt, but in view of their present inexperience I think that it would be better to postpone such a provision until the people can have had an opportunity for exercise in municipal government and until the first formative period of adapting the laws and procedure of the island to the new conditions shall have passed under the direction of a council composed of Porto Ricans selected for their known capacity and wisdom and Americans from the States competent and experienced in dealing with legislative and administrative problems. The constitution of such a legislature should be contemplated as a step to be taken in the near future.

I think the basis of suffrage should be that all who can read and write, or who hold property up to a specified small amount, may vote,

and no others. With a sufficient system of free primary education, the entire people should acquire the suffrage on this basis fully as soon as they are capable of using it understandingly.

For the successful working of such a scheme, or of any scheme of government for the island, it will be necessary that some cardinal rule shall be adopted and rigidly followed regarding appointment to office. Wherever a Porto Rican can be found capable and willing to perform official duties he should be selected, and the aim should be to include in the civil service of the island no greater number of Americans from the United States than are necessary for the introduction of the methods of administration in which Americans have been trained and Porto Ricans have not.

Wherever it is necessary to employ Americans, except in the chief offices, a system of civil-service examination should be provided, under which requests from the governor of Porto Rico for suitable persons to be appointed may be filled.

A necessary element to the success of this, or any scheme of government in Porto Rico, is the complete establishment of a system of education which will afford the opportunity for every child of school age in the island to acquire elementary instruction. The cost of this should be defrayed from the insular treasury, if its revenues are sufficient, and if not it should be regarded as a duty of the highest obligation resting upon the United States, and the expense should be borne by the United States.

I ask especial attention to the very valuable discussion of this subject contained in the report of Brig. Gen. George W. Davis, military governor of the island, submitted herewith.

(2) The answer to the second question, "What shall be the treatment of the municipal law of the island, and how far shall the laws. which now regulate the rights and conduct of the people be changed to conform to ideas which prevail among the people of the United States," presents little real difficulty. The civil code established by Spain for Cuba, Porto Rico, and the Philippines, and in force at the time of the cession, is an excellent body of laws, adequate in the main, and adapted to the customs and conditions of the people. It should be continued in force, with such gradual modification as experience from time to time suggests to those who are actually engaged in enforcing it.

The trouble has been not that the law was defective or vicious, but that it has never been fairly and honestly administered. The course of such an administration will naturally lead to amendments and

improvements, regarding which the people themselves who are to be affected by them should have a voice. The customs and conditions of the people who are to be governed must furnish the true basis for the law under which they are to live, and any attempt to substitute in these southern islands a system of laws based on the experience and characteristics of a New England community would be both oppressive and futile.

In order to secure a good administration of the laws, extensive changes in procedure will be necessary, and there should be material changes in the criminal law. The conditions of life are comparatively simple, and both the criminal laws and the methods of procedure may, in the first instance at least, be made simple also.

One of the ablest groups of men who ever addressed themselves to such a question in this or any other country undertook a similar task in adapting the laws of Louisiana, long living under Spanish law, to the new conditions which followed the cession of that territory to the United States. They followed with signal success the precise course above outlined.

A similar course was followed after the acquisition of Lower Canada by the English in 1763. The French province had been governed by the laws and ordinances of France and the custom of Paris, a mingled system of Roman and Frankish law. By the statute of 14, George III, the English law was introduced in criminal matters, and the private law in civil matters was left undisturbed. The result appears to have been entirely satisfactory both to the French population of Quebec and to the remainder of the Dominion which has been settled and governed under English law.

(3) The question of the economic treatment of the island underlies all the others. If the people are prosperous and have an abundance of the necessities of life, they will with justice be easily governed, and will with patience be easily educated. If they are left in hunger and hopeless poverty, they will be discontented, intractable, and mutinous. The principal difficulty now in the island of Porto Rico is that the transfer of the island from Spain to the United States has not resulted in an increase of prosperity, but in the reverse. The industry of the island is almost entirely agricultural. The people live upon the products of their own soil and upon the articles for which they exchange their sur plus products abroad. Their production is in the main of coffee, sugar, and tobacco. The prosperity of the island depends upon their success in selling these products.

So long as the island was a part of the Spanish possessions there was substantially free trade with Spain and with Cuba. The total exports from Porto Rico for the four years preceding 1897 averaged about $16,609,000, of which an average of less than one-sixth part ($2,630,000) was sold to the United States and an average of onehalf ($8,025,000) was sold to Spain and Cuba. Immediately upon the transfer of the island from Spain to the United States, Spain erected a tariff barrier against the introduction of Porto Rican products. The interests of Cuban agriculture led to the erection of a similar barrier in the tariff adopted for Cuba, so that Porto Rico was debarred from the principal markets which she had previously enjoyed, and at the same time this country has maintained its tariff against Porto Rican products just as it existed while the island was Spanish territory. The result is that there has been a wall built around the industry of Porto Rico.

Even before the hurricane of August 8, 1899, two crops of tobacco lay in the warehouses of Porto Rico, which the owners were unable to sell at prices equal to the cost of production. Their sugar shared the prevailing depression in that commodity, arising from the competition of bounty-fed beet sugar. Their coffee was practically unknown in the United States and had no market here. It is plain that it is essential to the prosperity of the island that she should receive substantially the same treatment at our hands as she received from Spain while a Spanish colony, and that the markets of the United States should be opened to her as were the markets of Spain and Cuba before the transfer of allegiance. Congress has the legal right to regulate the customs duties between the United States and Porto Rico as it pleases; but the highest considerations of justice and good faith demand that we should not disappoint the confident expectation of sharing in our prosperity with which the people of Porto Rico so gladly transferred their allegiance to the United States, and that we should treat the interests of this people as our own; and I wish most strongly to urge that the customs duties between Porto Rico and the United States be removed.

Our temporary occupation of the island of Cuba involves a very simple plan of operation, with some difficulties in its application which are apt to be overlooked by those who are impatient for immediate results. The control which we are exercising in trust for the people of Cuba should not be, and of course will not be, continued any longer than is necessary to enable that people to establish a suitable government to which the control shall be transferred, which shall really represent the

people of Cuba and be able to maintain order and discharge its international obligations. When that government is established it will be its duty and right to solve for Cuba the problems above discussed in regard to Porto Rico. Our present duty is limited to giving every assistance in our power to the establishment of such a government, and to maintaining order and promoting the welfare of the people of Cuba during the period necessarily required for that process.

The conduct of the Cuban people has been admirable. There have, of course, been some agitators who have loudly voiced their discontent over not being allowed to personally conduct the government themselves, but the substantial body of educated Cubans have shown. themselves to be patriotic, appreciative, and helpful, while the great body of uneducated Cubans have been patient and law abiding. The fact, however, that probably two-thirds of the people of the island are unable to read and write; that the people in general have had no experience in any real self-government, but have been for centuries under the dominion of arbitrary power; that the bloody conflicts which raged so long have necessarily left behind bitter factional feeling, make it necessary to proceed somewhat more slowly in the formation of a government which is to command universal respect and allegiance than would be necessary in a country accustomed to the discussion of public questions, familiar with the problems presented, and trained to the acceptance of the decisions reached by the ballot.

The year allowed by the treaty for the Spanish population of the island to elect whether they will be Cuban or Spanish citizens will expire on the 11th of April next. It will then, for the first time, be possible to determine who are the citizens of Cuba entitled to take a part in her government. By that time it is believed that, the results of the census having been computed and tabulated, we shall be ready to provide for municipal elections, which will place all the local gov ernments of the island in the hands of representatives elected by the people, and that when these local governments, thus elected, are established they will be ready to proceed to the formation of a representative convention to frame a constitution and provide for a general government of the island, to which the United States will surrrender the reins of government. When that government is established the relations which exist between it and the United States will be matter for free and uncontrolled agreement between the two parties.

The uncertainty which retards the industrial development of Cuba and prevents the influx of capital is not only as to the character of the