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sumed to be withdrawn.

But if this technically discharges the obligation to Spain it may still remain with regard to foreign nations. The old writers on international law made much of the necessity of the causes and objects of war being declared not only to the adversary but to neutral nations.

Thus Vattel: "A sovereign is to make the declaration of war public within his dominions, for the information and direction of his subjects. He is also to make known his declaration of war to the neutral powers, in order to acquaint them with the justificatory reasons which authorize it—the cause which obliges him to take up arms-and to notify them that such or such a nation is his enemy, that they may conduct themselves accordingly. This publication of the war may be called declaration, and that which is notified directly to the enemy, denunciation; and indeed the Latin term is denunciatio belli."

Although a publication or declaration to the neutral nations of the causes of the war may not be technically so indispensable as Vattel sought to establish, yet the terms of a justification, actually made, have a certain obligatory force, for a reason implied, but not mentioned, in Vattel's reasoning. It is in view of everything contained in such a declaration that other powers determine whether they will remain neutral, or whether they will unitedly interfere, or severally ally themselves with one or other of the original parties to the war. The nations which have so held themselves neutral will expect the terms and conditions, announced as the cause and purpose of the war, to be adhered to after its conclusion.

Europe has never ceased to keep Great Britain in mind of the undertaking upon which, in the presence of Europe, she entered into possession of Egypt; namely, that she would remain as long as the condition of the country made it necessary. It was an elastically expressed condition, and is not likely to be fulfilled as long as the inhabitants of Egypt are principally Fellaheen, and the ruling classes Mahommedans; nor as long as the departure of Great Britain would cast the reversion of supremacy upon the corrupt and oppressive powers at Constantinople. Europe is unlikely to insist on a recession of Christendom before Mahommedanism.

In the case of the United States the disclaimer of annexation and the undertaking to retire when pacification is accomplished, are clear and definite. Exact fulfilment may be insisted upon with

all the influence of the Council of nations, in whose presence the pledge was made. No doubt the United States may find plentiful examples of perfidiousness in European history. The question for herself is whether it will be to her advantage in the long run to imitate them. As a newcomer in the great world of international politics, she has her character to make.

A curious rumour was reported by the Times' correspondent at Madrid: "Once or twice General Woodford used in the presence of the Spaniards who were not officially connected with the negotiations, but who were in intimate private relations with influential personages, certain vague expressions which were rightly or wrongly interpreted to mean that an amicable arrangement, satisfactory to all parties, might be found in some financial operation. At a very early stage of the negotiations important information emanating from a trustworthy source in Washington reached the Spanish Government, and even found its way in a diluted form into the Spanish newspapers. It was to the effect that a very wealthy syndicate had been formed for developing the enormous natural resources of Cuba, that it was ready to take over the Cuban debt on condition of being entrusted with the financial administration and protected by a guarantee of the United States Government, and that the scheme had found favour in the eyes of President McKinley. With regard to the question of sovereignty the syndicate was quite indifferent, and was ready to acknowledge Spain as its nominal overlord, and even pay to the Spanish Treasury a small royalty on its mining operations, provided always that it was in no way hampered by the Spanish Government or by Spanish. officials. It is not surprising that Mr. McKinley should have regarded the project with favour, because it semed to furnish a means of bringing Spanish domination in Cuba to an end without the necessity of going to war and without using even such a disagreeable term as 'the sale of the island.' More than this, it helped the United States Government out of a serious difficulty. It is no secret that Mr. McKinley, like very many of his countrymen, regards the absorption of Cuba into the United States as the inevitable ultimate solution of the Cuban question, but he perceives clearly the practical inconveniences and the serious dangers of immediate annexation. For this reason he would like an intermediate transitional stage during which the people could be educated up to the level required for absorption."

Whether or not such a syndicate proposition was secretly en

tertained by the President before the war, and whether or not such a syndicate still stands ready to carry out the scheme, it is inevitable, in case the United States Government controls Cuba, that an abundance of schemers will seek to make the United States Government, or its representatives, the engine to obtain concessions and other advantages for themselves, at the expense of the inhabitants. It was virtually for the suppression of the forced exploitation of the Cubans by foreigners that the American people undertook the expulsion of Spain. Will they consent to replace Spanish exploitation by exploitation through an American syndicate, under the protection of a United States army of occupation?

Unhappily the state of Cuba will, very likely, too truly resemble that of Crete. The war has been more or less a civil war between the two parties, the Spaniard born settlers and the native Cubans of various origins. Divided as these two parties will have been by bitter conflict in arms, reconciliation and fair and honourable co-operation will be a distant probability.

Is the United States to take sides in this division of parties by expelling the Spanish element or by keeping them under subjection to the other party by arms? I cannot believe that the people of the United States will desire to re-enact in Cuba the scandal of the carpet bag Governments of the Southern States. If the United States Government, on the expulsion of the Spanish troops, retires at once from Cuba, it leaves, in all probability, a state of affairs more hopelessly disastrous than that which it entered to terminate. The promise of pacification would be unfulfilled. A course which most obviously corresponds with the constitutional situation created by the resolution declaring war, also corresponds best with the European precedents in Crete and Egypt.

The resolution of Congress excludes Cuba from Congressional jurisdiction, by the declaration that the control shall be only a control and possession for pacification, that is, necessarily by the military forces. Under the Constitution of the United States the command of the army outside of the boundaries of the United States is vested in the President. Through the army, acting under the directions of the President, Cuba may be occupied and controlled until the time comes when a real pacification is accomplished, and the island is fit to be left to the government and control of its people. The precedents of United States military administration of the Indian and other departments give every reason to expect that

in their hands, responsible only to the President, the trusteeship of Cuba would be honourably discharged. If military Commanders would be fitted for the whole duties of civil administration, the United States possesses men not unlike the stamp of civil administrators who have made so honourable a record for Great Britain in India and Egypt. Their services have been lent to China, Egypt, and Japan, where they have displayed not only abundant ability but that rarer and higher quality, the spirit of trusteeship. Under such auspices, provided successive Presidents were permitted to employ them, American, British and other European settlers might be attracted to share in the development of the island. In time these would become a moderating and probably controlling third element of the population, and a basis would then exist for peaceable and businesslike self-government. Following the precedent which it was necessary for Great Britain to make in Egypt, a firm and honest military Government must not only be established, but assurance given that its administration will continue to secure peace and protection; and that enterprising settlers will not be prematurely abandoned to anarchy or a ruinous regime of adventures,

The United States administrators cannot honourably either directly, or through any pretence of local autonomy, make the control of revenues and taxation a means of excluding the trade of foreign nations. A military Government would have the right to charge the revenues with the expenses of the occupation and to levy the necessary imposts. But inasmuch as the declaration of Congress has disclaimed sovereignty, jurisdiction or control, except for pacification, the British methods in Egypt will be obligatory in honour in respect to the methods of raising revenue. To give a preference in trade to the United States would be a violation of the trusteeship, and a breach of the principle of the undertaking given in the face of Europe.

United States occupation would involve another embarrassment arising out of the peculiar status under the initiatory declaration. Recognizing no insurgent government or status of independence, the United States, by necessary implication, acknowledged the continuance down to that date of the actual lawful government over Cuba. The acts done by that lawful government, the laws declared and contracts created in respect of Cuba are valid and binding at this moment. Cuba now stands charged with a large public debt, lawfully, even if oppressively, made payable out of its

revenues by its hitherto existing Government. Inasmuch as the island is not to be a conquest of the United States, the United States will have no right or power on their own behalf to alter the status of the island in respect to these obligations. The island cannot become freed from them merely by virtue of any later assertion of independence by its own inhabitants. By the law and practice of nations, which Continental Europe may call upon the United States to respect, independence will not legally exist until there has been a treaty of peace between the original sovereign and the separated territory. The United States plenipotentiaries in 1783 recognized the necessity of such an acknowledgment from the King of Great Britain, and most anxiously exacted it, before proceeding to negotiate any other article of that most important treaty of peace. The United States may be in possession of Cuba by her troops but she cannot compel Spain to conclude peace and recognize the independence of the island. Terms of peace will, therefore, require to be arranged, and European nations may support Spain in withholding her consent, unless an equitable charge is agreed to upon the revenues of Cuba in respect of its existing debt, of which Spain is in a position of guarantor to the holders of the bonds.

Spain's claim in this respect will be immensely fortified if she abstains from the right of waging destructive war upon the United States commerce. The forbearance will give her a moral claim which the people of the United States themselves will feel obliged to recognize. The Spanish Government would, of course, be in a still better position if it were to treat for peace while still in possession of Cuba.

There is another and more magnanimous course, by which at the same time, the United States might relieve itself from many difficulties, and abandon Cuba to its own inhabitants, without responsibility for the use they may make of their freedom. The President's original position might be reverted to, by an interpretation of the ultimatum that would involve no stultification of the declaration by the United States Congress, that the people of Cuba are and of right ought to be free and independent.

This assertion, and the demand made in the ultimatum of the United States Congress, that Spain should withdraw her government and authority, would as a constitutional fact be satisfied by the continuance of Cuba under the nominal sovereignty of the Spanish Crown, according to a facsimile of the Constitution of

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