Puerto Rico's struggle for independence
Following are excerpts from a talk given by John Ramirez
at a New York Workers World Party meeting on Feb. 27.
The U.S. ruling class is very afraid of Puerto
Rican revolutionaries. To explain this fear, I will give a
brief account of history of the land I come from. I want to
honor the many brave women and men who have given their lives
for my nation, Puerto Rico.
At the end of the 19th century, with the end of slavery, the
independence movement was gaining strength and the industrial
age was catching up with the island. In 1897, the same year
telephone service was inaugurated, on Nov. 25, the Auto nomic
Charter (Carta Autonómica) was approved in Spain.
Made effective on Feb. 9, 1898, the Autonomic Charter
limited the actions of the appointed governor to only those
authorized by a cabinet dominated by locally elected officials.
Nine days later, on Feb. 18, 1898, the battleship USS Maine was
sunk in Havana harbor, providing the excuse for the
Spanish-American War.
On July 25, 1898, Gen. Nelson Miles, who once hunted down
Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, landed at the town of
Guánica in the South of Puerto Rico.
As the island was taken by U.S. military forces,
Ramón Emeterio Betances, the major proponent of the
revolutionary movement against Spanish domination, died in
exile in France. From exile, he had directed "El Grito de
Lares" on Sept. 23 1868, when independence was declared in a
revolt centered in the town of Lares. He was also co-founder of
the Abolitionist League.
On Dec. 10 the Treaty of Paris was signed. Puerto Rico was
illegally signed away to the United States as a war trophy.
The government of Puerto Rico was taken by the United
States, which immediately started modeling it for its own
economic interests. After an initial period of military
control, the United States established civil governments, first
with the Foraker Law in 1900 and then with the Jones Act in
1917.
This latter law imposed U.S. citizenship in the island,
which was used for the compulsory draft of 20,000 islanders
into World War I.
The immediate view of Puerto Ricans as cannon fodder was
made even clearer when the ROTC program was made compulsory for
university students in 1919.
As a response to the increasing oppression of workers on the
island, the first socialist party was founded in 1920 by
Santiago Iglesias Pantín. He was immediately elected
senator.
In 1922, the U.S. Supreme Court made the island's colonial
status clear when it declared in the case Balzac vs. Porto Rico
that the U.S. Constitution did not apply on the island. On
Sept. 17 of that same year, the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party
was founded.
Don Pedro Albizu Campos became president of the Nationalist
Party in 1930. Ordered to liberate Puerto Rico from the United
States by Pedro Angleró, the last survivor of "El Grito
de Lares," Albizu Campos proclaimed in 1932 that popular insu
rgence was the way to freedom.
In 1934, major strikes occurred throughout the island. As a
reply the United States appointed Gen. Blaton Winship as
governor. Winship brought in Col. Francis Riggs as chief of
police.
Riggs had earlier assisted Nicaragua's dictator Anastasio
Somoza in killing Augusto Cesar Sandino.
On Oct. 24, 1935, Riggs gave orders to fire on nationalists
at a demonstration at the University of Puerto Rico.
Ramón S. Pagan, Pedro Quiñones, Eduardo
Rodríguez Vera, and the youth José Santiago Barea
were shot dead in the Massacre of Río Piedras. Also, one
bystander was killed and three others were injured.
The next year, on Feb. 23, nationalists Hiram Rosado and
Elias Beauchamp killed Police Chief Riggs in San Juan in
retaliation for the massacre. Rosado and Beauchamp were
captured and executed at the police headquarters.
In 1937, the Nationalist Party called for a March 21 march
in Ponce to commemorate the abolition of slavery on the island.
Permits were withdrawn an hour before the event started, at
request of Gov. Winship. Police fired on the group as they
began
marching with their national anthem, "La
Borinqueña."
At the end, 21 people were dead and 200 wounded. This became
known as the Ponce Massacre.
Ex-nationalist traitor and demagogue Luis Muñoz
Marín founded the Democratic Popular Party in 1938,
adopting the slogan "Bread, Land, and Liberty." In 1940, the
U.S. Congress declared Puerto Rican natives to be U.S.
citizens, preparing for the massive draft during World War
II.
In 1948, as preparation for the elections, local authorities
passed the "gag law" that prohibited advocating the overthrow
of the U.S. government in Puerto Rico. Even raising the Puerto
Rican flag was made illegal. Under these conditions
Marín won the first elections for local governor, which
the Nationalists boycotted.
On Oct. 30, 1950, a major uprising occurred. The Second
Republic of Puerto Rico was declared. This was "El Grito de
Jayuya."
The U.S. Air Force bombed the town. The National Guard was
used for the repression. The people were not allowed to put the
dead bodies away until the afternoon of the next day.
If this event could be suppressed from the world news, the
attack on Blair House could not. On Nov. 1, 1950, two Puerto
Rican Nationalists living in New York--Oscar Collazo and
Griselio Torresola--went to Washington, D.C., in an attempt to
kill President Harry S. Truman, who had ordered the nuclear
bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Griselio died in the
attempt. Collazo was captured, tried and sentenced to
death.
After Truman commuted his sentence to life in prison,
Collazo replied, "When the last Yankee soldier leaves the
Puerto Rican territory, I'll be glad to write a letter of
appreciation to the president of the United States."
As an insult to Puerto Rico, Marín inaugurated the
first local constitution of the newly declared Commonwealth of
Puerto Rico on July 25, 1952--the anniversary of the U.S.
invasion of Puerto Rico. With this phony arrangement, in 1953
the United States pushed United Nations resolution 748 (VIII),
which exempted the United States from rendering an account of
Puerto Rico to the General Assembly.
Now came March 1, 1954.
Because of the pressure from the United States, Puerto Rican
Nationalist Party delegates were not allowed to travel to
Venezuela to take their seats at the Interamerican Conference
that started that day in Caracas. That same day, the U.S.
Congress discussed immigration from Mexico.
By instruction of Pedro Albizu Campos and led by Dolores
(Lolita) Lebrón Sotomayor, Andrés Figueroa
Cordero, Irving Flores Rodríguez, and Rafael Cancel
Miranda arrived in Washington, D.C., from New York. The group
of four walked into the gallery of the U.S. Congress and fired
on the members of Congress below, as they displayed the Puerto
Rican flag and Lolita Lebron shouted, "Free Puerto Rico
now!"'
Five members of Congress were hurt, some severely, but no
one was killed. The four Puerto Ricans were captured and
received long prison sentences. They refused parole after many
years of incarceration.
On March 8, 1954, Marín declared the Nationalist and
Communist parties illegal. The witch hunt against the
independence and socialist movements intensified.
At the same time the island was turned into a laboratory for
social and industrial experimentation. The population was
subjected to experimentation with forced sterilization
methods.
On Jan. 24, 1975, a bomb exploded in historic Fraunces
Tavern in New York, killing four and injuring over 50 people.
The Puerto Rican group, Armed Forces of National Liberation
(FALN), claimed responsibility.
On Sept. 6, 1979, under intense pressure, Pre sident Jimmy
Carter granted executive clemency, freeing the four remaining
Puerto Rican Nation alists: Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel
Miranda and Irving Flores, who had been in prison since 1954,
and Oscar Collazo, who had been behind bars since 1950.
Andrés Figueroa Cordero had been released earlier, on
Oct. 6, 1977, due to bad health conditions. He would die in
March 1979.
All these releases made headlines in Workers World
newspaper. The Party had been very active in the campaign for
their release.
On Jan. 11, 1981, the Boricua Popular Army--the
"Macheteros"--blew up 11 jet fighters of Puerto Rico's National
Guard in San Juan.
On Dec. 31, 1982, New York was the scene of a series of
bombings credited to the FALN: first at the FBI headquarters at
26 Federal Plaza, then at the police headquarters at One Police
Plaza, and a third at the federal courthouse on Cadman Plaza in
Brooklyn.
Many others have given their lives for the liberation of
Puerto Rico.
On Feb. 28, 2004, the remaining survivors, Lolita
Lebrón and Rafael Cancel Miranda, were in Mayagüez
for an event commemorating the 50th anniversary of their attack
on the U.S. Congress. Their lives have already been given to
the Nationalist cause.
Reprinted from the March 11, 2004, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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