The Forgotten Empire
To most people, Puerto Rico is known only through Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim’s iconic musical West Side Story ( its cinematic adaptation is one of my favorite films). Practically the other possible reason for which people might have heard of Puerto Rico is because of the frequent hurricanes which strike it, most recently Hurricane Maria in 2017. To be honest, even my conception of this archipelago, located in the north Caribbean roughly 1600 km south-east of Miami, was decidedly vague until recent times.
But perhaps that is not completely my fault, because to this day the government of the United States has never made it clear to its own subjects precisely what relation Puerto Rico bears to the United States of America. Puerto Rico is, obviously, not a State of America. Rather, it an “Unincorporated Territory .
Before we get to asking what exactly is an Unincorporated Territory, another question arises. Namely, does being an Unincorporated Territory have any particular ill-effect on the citizens of Puerto Rico? Simply speaking, yes. The people of Puerto Rico have no real representation and no voting powers in the Central Legislature of the United States. Their only representation in Congress is a Non-Voting Commissioner. Nominally, Puerto Rico has a republican form of government, like other American States. But all its powers are subordinated by Congress, a body where, as described above, the Puerto Ricans have no vote. Bluntly put, Puerto Rico is governed by diktat by a legislative body which they have no power to influence.
The differences do not stop there. Puerto Ricans cannot vote in US presidential elections, (even though the President remains their Head of State). The US Constitutions Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees citizenship to anyone born in the United States does not apply in Puerto Rico. The people of Puerto Rico were granted US citizenship only in 1917, a full 19 years after Puerto Rico became part of America in 1898. Even this citizenship was granted only by an act of Congress, and it can be rescinded at any time. Finally, the constitutional right of a US citizen to a trial by jury, which is prevalent in every single American state, vanishes in Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico is not the only such “Unincorporated Territory” present in the USA. There are currently 13 such Unincorporated Territories, out of which 5 are populated. Together, they contain a population of approximately four million. Other than Puerto Rico, the neighboring US Virgin Islands were granted citizenship in 1927, Guam in 1950 and the Northern Mariana Islands (which are nearly 11,000 km distant from mainland America) in 1986. The 55,000 inhabitants of American Samoa, despite being under American rule since 1900, still have not been granted citizenship. They are allowed to die for America ( American Samoa has the highest rate of military enlistment of any US state or territory), but they cannot vote for it.
The inhabitants of these five unincorporated territories remain subjects of the worlds only colonial empire that is still extant. Their people have no representation in Congress, cannot vote for the President (or even become President, unless they take up residence in one of the Mainland States). Their rights and citizenship remain a gift from Washington. America can still call upon them to fight for it, though; Conscription, as an adjunct to citizenship, remains in force in all of the territories except American Samoa.
We now return to to our earlier question; What are these Unincorporated Territories ? The answer is exceedingly simple. They are the last remnants of America’s forgotten empire.
Prologue: Puerto Rico and Spain
The island of Puerto Rico was discovered by Christopher Columbus in his second voyage, on 19 November, 1493. Subsequently, Caparra, the first Spanish settlement on the island, was founded by Juan Ponce de Leon in 1508. Puerto Rico would remain a colony of Spain for the next 390 years.
In the early 19th century, as Spain’s empire in South America collapsed under the onslaught of Simon Bolivar and his ilk, a nascent independence movement was spawned in Puerto Rico as well, but this was ruthlessly suppressed. A second uprising,known as the “Grito de Lares” (‘Cry’ or ‘Scream’ of Lares) would occur in 1868. During this uprising, a flag was devised which would become known as the “First Puerto Rican flag in Puerto Rico.”
Finally, in 1898, the USA went to war with Spain over Cuba and the Philippines. This short lived war was resolved by the Treaty of Paris, by the terms of which Spain ceded Guam, Puerto Rico and the Philippines to the USA, and relinquished sovereignty over Cuba.
The Advent of America
In the Philippines, which had been violently battling Spanish rule since 1896, its replacement by American imperialism was not welcomed. Emilio Aguinaldo, the 29 year old leader of the Filipino revolution, immediately declared himself President of an independent Filipino republic and ordered his army into battle against the Americans (American rule in the Philippines would persist, in one form or another, till 1946).
But in Puerto Rico, the situation was quite different. When American troops landed in Puerto Rico, crowds gathered to cheer them on. American soldiers were presented with cigars, fruits and flowers by the cheering populace, while municipal officials renamed streets after Washington and Lincoln.
Many Puerto Ricans believed that they had much to gain by replacing Spain with the United States. Economically, they would benefit greatly by American trade and access to American markets. Politically, they understood the United States to be a Grand Federation, a “Republic of Republics” and hoped to join it on equal terms, and eventually gain statehood.
Two political parties were formed, namely the Republicans and the Federalists, but they both sought statehood. As the Federalist platform put it, “Puerto Rico was to be a prosperous and happy country under the shadow of the American flag.”
At that time, in the town of Ponce, named after the Spaniard Ponce de Leon, there lived a seven year old boy named Pedro Albizu Campos. His hometown of Ponce was the center of the American occupation. The locals there were described by one US journalist as “the most friendly souls in the world…. delirious with enthusiasm for the United States.”
Unfortunately, the enthusiasm of the Puerto Ricans was quite misplaced. Even now, 122 years after the advent of American rule, their hopes for statehood remain unfulfilled.
And what became of Pedro Albizu Campos, the boy whose school superintendent described him as a “lover of everything American”; the student who while at Harvard became fluent in six languages and graduated from Harvard Law School at the top of his class ? One day, he would become the most dangerous anti-imperialist the United States would ever face.
