Puerto Rico’s Fight for Independence
Part 1 of our series is “Puerto Rico’s Fight for Independence.”
Part 2 is “The State Persecution of Puerto Rico’s Independistas.”
Part 3 is “American Tortures in the Lexington Women’s Unit 1986-88.”
This work is presented by the Kasama project.
The Early Years — 1898-1954
by Mike Ely
July 25, 1898–thousands of U.S. troops invaded Puerto Rico’s southern coast from the sea–landing at the small port of Guánica and then in the larger town of Ponce. A force of 16,000 moved onto the island, commanded by U.S. General Nelson A. Miles. In Puerto Rico, African slaves, Native peoples and Spanish immigrants had already forged a unique people and rich culture during 400 years of Spanish colonial rule. A million people lived on the island, mainly scattered in small villages, fishing and farming to gather the food they needed. These Puerto Rican people had long fought their oppressors.
The Taino Indian people had fought from the beginning–in the face of genocidal policies that drove them into the highlands and left few of them alive. The captive Africans had risen up in repeated uprisings against their enslavement. And, in 1868, the independent Republic of Puerto Rico was first proclaimed in the famous armed uprising against Spain — El Grito de Lares, the Cry of Lares.
The U.S. high command had chosen to land their troops on the island’s southern coast because the people were known for their resistance to the central colonial authorities. When the U.S. troops landed, many Puerto Rican people welcomed them. Everyone knew that the U.S. had also once been a colony. And they believed that its armed forces had come to end Spanish oppression. In towns like Ciales, Adjuntas, Yauco, and Mayaguez, Puerto Rican guerillero bands took up arms against the Spanish. But when a treaty was finally signed on December 10, 1898 in Paris, passing the Spanish colonies of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines to U.S. control, the people of those countries were not consulted or involved. Their local governing bodies were ignored.
When the Spanish flag was lowered at San Juan’s La Fortaleza palace, it was the Yankee Stars and Stripes that took its place. There was some armed resistance to the new U.S. domination. It was four years before it was finally silenced. As Maoist revolutionaries say: While the tiger was driven out the front door, the wolf had slipped in the back.
A Prize of War
“Cuba and Puerto Rico are natural appendages of the United States.”
John Quincy Adams, 1823, then Secretary of State to President Monroe
“We have not come to make war upon the people of a country that for centuries has been oppressed, but, on the contrary, to bring you protection, not only to yourselves but to your property, to promote your prosperity, and to bestow upon you the immunities and blessings of the liberal institutions of our government.”
Proclamation by General Nelson A. Miles to the people of Puerto Rico, 1898
“English spoken here”
Sign posted by U.S. troops in Ponce 1898
“An island or a small group of islands acquired for naval purposes does not differ greatly from a war vessel or fleet at anchor. It would be as improper to transfer the administration of such an island or island group from the Navy to another department as to turn over war vessels to any other than the Navy Department.”
Major General Frank McIntyre, head of U.S. War Department’s Bureau of Insular Affairs during World War 1
The U.S. ruling class had coveted Puerto Rico from the early days of the North American republic. And despite its claims to oppose colonialism, its troops came as new conquerors. Even before the July 25th invasion, the decision had already been made to take Puerto Rico as “Spanish war indemnity.” Senator Perkins described the island as a U.S. “prize of war.” The new U.S. rulers insisted that the Puerto Rican people needed “protection” and “tutoring.”
In crude racist language, Puerto Ricans were described as a “mongrel people” who needed to be taught “civilization.” Someday (it was implied), the islanders would be “ready” to govern themselves. This was classic colonialist self-justification. In 1900 this colonial rule was formalized. The U.S. Congress passed the Foraker Act–which decreed that Puerto Ricans would be ruled by a governor appointed by the U.S. president. A century has now passed since the U.S. invasion–and Puerto Rico is still not free. And the official life of this island continues to be dominated by the decisions made in this foreign and distant U.S. Congress. In 1917–as World War 1 was raging–the U.S. decided to tighten its legal annexation of Puerto Rico. U.S. citizenship was imposed on the Puerto Rican people by the Jones Act–without their consent and over the unanimous objection of the island’s House of Delegates.
In other countries, like Cuba and Panama, the U.S. was refining a system of neo-colonial rule, where they controlled countries through phony “independent” governments. But in Puerto Rico, they chose to impose colonial rule–a sign that they intended to directly rule the Puerto Rican people forever. This same Jones Act created a new toothless legislature for Puerto Rico. This body asked the U.S. Congress five times to take up the question of Puerto Rico’s status–Washington didn’t even answer the letters.
The real control of the island was handed over to the Navy and the U.S. War Department who ruled it until 1934. The Puerto Rican independence leader Pedro Albizu Campos used to say in the 1930s that these invaders were “interested in the cage, not the bird.” The U.S. strategic planners intended to hold Puerto Rico’s territory and make it a key military base for dominating the surrounding region.
Satisfying the Empire’s Sweet Tooth
“There is today more widespread misery and destitution and far more unemployment in Puerto Rico than at any previous time in its history.”
Harold Ickes, Secretary of the Interior for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1935
U.S. capitalists quickly followed their troops into Puerto Rico, eyeing their new possession for ways to make money. Step by step, U.S. corporations snatched up the best land. The homegrown owning classes of Puerto Rico were bought out and shoved aside. Many working people lost their small farms and growing numbers were forced to work on huge Yankee-owned plantations as wage workers or sharecroppers. They often made as little as $1 a day, and lived with bitter poverty and hunger.
Meanwhile, the U.S. colonialists sent missionaries and enforcers to undermine the language and culture of the people. Puerto Rican teachers were ordered to teach children in English. The economy of the island was twisted to serve U.S. interests in the world market. And the rich land no longer produced the food that people ate. Production went for export, and the people were forced to buy U.S. products for their basic needs. Then in 1929 the Great Depression brought a sharp decline in the sugar economy–and the people were left with almost nothing. The suffering was intense. Oppression gave rise to resistance.
A radical new Puerto Rican independence movement was born. Pedro Albizu Campos rose to the leadership of the island’s Puerto Rican Nationalist Party (PNP) in 1930. Inspired by the anti-British struggle of Ireland, he led his followers onto a daring path of militant and uncompromising resistance.
The Nationalists were a revolutionary movement most firmly rooted among the middle classes of Puerto Rico. It did not have a clear perspective of how to win independence from the Yankees, and did not have a clear sense of the kind of society it would build after independence was won.
But the PNP did make several far-sighted and path-breaking contributions to the politics of the Puerto Rican people. The Nationalist Party promoted the principle of retraimiento–rejection of official politics and colonial elections. They boldly proclaimed that U.S. domination of Puerto Rico was illegal and illegitimate–and refused to recognize the colonial authorities, their courts or laws. They pointedly accused the U.S. of causing the ruin and poverty of Puerto Rico’s people. And they sought international recognition for Puerto Rico’s right to independence. Most daring of all, they taught that Puerto Rican people had a right to wage armed struggle against the U.S. invaders.
Albizu Campos declared he was working to form a revolutionary army to drive out the North Americans. Knowing that they were challenging a ruthless and powerful military power, the movement trained its members in an intense sense of moral righteousness and fearless self-sacrifice. The poet-revolutionary Juan Antonio Corretjer talks of the movement’s “mixture of nationalism, mysticism and revolutionary fervor.”
The Revolt of the Jíbaros
In 1934 a major turning point arrived. In early January, thousands of jíbaros, the landless peasants of the island, walked out of the sugar cane fields of the Armstrong-owned plantation in Fajard. Their furious wildcat strike spread.
The farmworkers were disgusted with their sellout leadership–and they sought out the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, asking Albizu Campos to lead them. The Nationalists wholeheartedly threw themselves into the strike–and the combined movement shook the island. The colonial rulers were terrified at the specter of a mass revolutionary movement.
Agents of U.S. corporations formed the “Citizens Committee of One Thousand for the Preservation of Peace and Order” who cabled the U.S. President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, to report, “A state of actual anarchy exists. Towns in state of siege, police impotent, businesses paralyzed.” General Blanton Winship was appointed governor to suppress the people. His top aide, the soon-notorious Colonel Francis Riggs, became the island’s police chief. The authorities moved to calm the movement with a series of concessions, while they prepared to break up its most organized forces using brutal means. The island’s police were quickly militarized.
Teams of FBI agents secretly arrived on the island to target the independence movement. Wherever the new independence movement raised its head, these forces responded with harassment and killings. Several attempts were made on Albizu Campos’s life. After repeated police murders of Nationalists, Albizu Campos announced that his movement would respond by targeting representatives of the U.S. imperialists. 
In October 1935, three Nationalists were killed by police bullets outside the island’s main university. On February 23, 1936, Colonel Frances Riggs–head of this counterrevolutionary campaign–was shot dead. The two young Nationalists who killed him, Elias Beauchamp and Hiram Rosado, were then murdered in the police headquarters shortly after their capture.
On March 5, 1936, the Nationalist leadership was charged with seditious conspiracy–conspiring to overthrow the federal government in Puerto Rico. The first trial (in the English-only federal courts) ended when the seven Puerto Ricans on the jury of 12 refused to convict. In a crude act of railroading, the authorities then handpicked a new jury with 10 Anglo-Americans and condemned Albizu Campos to federal prison in late 1936.
The Ponce Massacre
“Viva la República. Down with the assassins.”
Written on a wall by a dying Puerto Rican fighter, Ponce, 1937
The authorities moved to suppress the remaining movement by force. The Nationalist Party called for a march to commemorate the abolition of slavery on the island. It was planned for Palm Sunday, March 21, 1937, in the southern city of Ponce. The local authorities first granted a permit and then, on orders from General/ Governor Winship, the permits were withdrawn.
Hundreds of police were rushed to Ponce to carry out a planned ambush. On the appointed day, PNP’s youth group defied the ban on the march and lined up in ranks along Marina Street. About 80 young men stood proud, dressed as Cadets in black shirts and white pants. Then came a bold contingent of young women dressed all in white. Following them was a five-piece band playing La Borinqueña, the island’s anthem. The crowd cheered. Suddenly, police lines moved into place, both in front and in back.
The cops were heavily armed–including a special squad of nine men with Thompson submachine guns. The unarmed youth stood their ground bravely, without panic. The police simply opened fire on the march, and kept shooting. Marchers, supporters, bystanders, even small children went down before the police bullets. Then the cops rushed the survivors, shooting some at point blank range, and clubbing others.
Twenty-two were killed and over 100 wounded. Defying the threat of new police attacks, more than 15,000 attended the funerals at Ponce, and more than 5,000 in Mayaguez. The victims of the massacre were tried for conspiracy to commit murder. Permits were denied to future Nationalist marches.
More police killings followed. President Roosevelt refused to recall Winship. On July 25, 1938, Winship organized a military parade though Ponce to celebrate the U.S. invasion of 1898. It was intended as a show of force.
Rejecting the Blood Tax
Under intense attacks, and with much of their leadership in prison, the remaining Nationalists continued to struggle. World War 2 soon broke out, and thousands of Puerto Rican men were ordered into the military. On President Franklin Roosevelt’s orders, steps were taken to create the world’s largest naval base on the eastern side of the island.
The Nationalists denounced the military draft as a colonial “blood tax” on their people. They organized the island’s youth to resist the draft. This consistent anti-imperialism was considered shocking–even by many leftists of the time–and the Nationalists were even accused of being “pro-fascist” for refusing to join the U.S. imperialist military. Scores of young Puerto Rican draft resisters were actually condemned to federal prisons. Many suffered extreme punishments. Some were even killed. Their stand inspired future generations–and helped give birth to the powerful movement of draft resistance that grew up in Puerto Rico during the Vietnam War.
Defying the “American Century”
World War 2 brought intense changes to the world–and to colonial countries like Puerto Rico. The U.S. emerged as the world’s biggest imperialist power and wanted to establish neo-colonial domination of many countries throughout the world. It was going to be, the U.S. imperialists said, the start of an “American Century.” As they pursued these plans, the U.S. imperialists found their open colonial rule in Puerto Rico to be an embarrassment. So they wanted to work out a new political arrangement with the appearance of local self government–while maintaining the reality of rule from Washington.
Meanwhile the plantation economy of Puerto Rico had forced many people off the land into growing slums like La Perla (the Pearl) and El Fangito (Little Mud). The imperialists were determined to better exploit these propertyless Puerto Ricans. The government launched a major campaign to create sweatshop factories–called “Operation Bootstrap.” In Puerto Rico itself, many people had a radically different idea of change. The whole world was rumbling with major anti-colonial struggles. In 1949 the Chinese revolution led by Mao Tsetung achieved victory over the forces of imperialism. And many thousands of Puerto Rican soldiers came back from war to a country without jobs–after eye-opening experiences with U.S.-style racism. A new movement for liberation stirred.
In 1947, an unrepentant Pedro Albizu Campos returned to the island from federal prison. He immediately crisscrossed the island speaking passionately against the reorganization plans of the imperialists and against the suffering of the Puerto Rican people. The authorities permitted moderate political forces on the island to discuss various neo-colonial visions of “independence.” But they were determined to keep control of Puerto Rico forever. They responded to Albizu Campos’s activities with intense repression. In 1948, the authorities passed the Ley de la Mordaza, the gag law. La Mordaza made it illegal to advocate the overthrow of the U.S. government in Puerto Rico. It was also known as “the Little Smith Act” because it was patterned after a similar fascist law passed for the mainland. In practice, such things as pro-independence speeches and poetry and even raising the Puerto Rican flag were treated as illegal.
The imperialists simply criminalized the politics of Puerto Rican liberation. And La Mordaza was immediately used to attack the PNP and eliminate its leadership. Albizu Campos was placed under intense police pressure. Police patrols followed him openly, occasionally in jeeps with mounted machine guns. Every person he talked to, even clerks in stores, would be visited by police and harassed. In 1948, Nationalists called on the Puerto Rican people to boycott the elections of a colonial governor. Almost half of the people stayed away from the polls. The U.S. ruling class was finalizing their plans to impose a new colonial arrangement on Puerto Rico. They wanted no militant, organized campaign against this new setup. And so, in April 1950, President Truman ordered his agents to destroy the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. The fascistic campaign that followed foreshadowed in many ways the murderous cointelpro operations unleashed against the Black Panther Party almost 20 years later.
The U.S. Secretary of War, Louis Jiohnson, went to Puerto Rico and met with U.S. military leaders for three days in April. Like Mafia godfathers, they met with the governor, Muñoz Marin, and gave him the order: either break up the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party or kill their leader, Albizu Campos. The Nationalists learned about this plot from their informants within the government. And they worked to alert the people of the danger. However, newspapers refused to carry the information–and would not even accept a paid advertisement. So the PNP organized a campaign of public meetings starting in Manati on June 11, 1950.
The Nationalists were determined to resist by any means necessary–and to take arms if they were denied peaceful avenues of resistance. On October 27, 1950, the police stopped a Nationalist car caravan near Panuelas. Four Nationalists and two police died in the resulting firefight. Albizu Campos called on the people to take up arms.
Taking Up Arms
On October 30, 1950, Puerto Rican fighters attacked police headquarters in Jayuya. They set fire to the building and destroyed the government offices in town. They proclaimed the Second Republic of Puerto Rico and raised their revolutionary flag.
The U.S. air forces bombed from the air, as National Guard troops advanced to take back the village. Blanca Canales, a woman who helped lead the Jayuya revolt, described how the U.S. forces massacred those who surrendered during the nearby uprising in Utuado. Similar armed revolts broke out in Arecibo, Mayaguez, and Naranjito. In San Juan, independence fighters attacked the governor’s palace–La Fortaleza, a symbol of colonial domination.
This was a time when the U.S. imperialists were perhaps at the most powerful and arrogant moment in their history. And in the face of such power, the independence forces of Puerto Rico dared to rise up in a powerful armed manifesto–a Grito de Jayuya. Altogether it was the most powerful uprising in Puerto Rican history, and the largest armed revolt on U.S.-claimed territory since the last wars of the Native Peoples in the 1890s. 
At the same time, it was a difficult moment to actually carry a revolutionary struggle through to victory–to the seizure of nationwide power. The armed fighting proved impossible to sustain. The various centers of revolt were put down one by one, as columns of National Guard troops moved across the island. The colonial police besieged Pedro Albizu Campos in his house for two days before the Nationalist fighters there laid down their arms and surrendered. Even then, the fighting was not over. November 1, 1950, the world was stunned to hear that the independentistas had taken the armed struggle to the U.S. mainland. Two Nationalists, Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola, attacked the temporary residence of President Truman in Washington’s Blair House. Torresola was killed at the scene and Collazo was wounded. Though the imperialist media had worked to suppress news of the uprisings on Puerto Rico itself, they could not ignore this armed act in their capital. At least 21 independentistas gave their lives in the uprising. And the whole world was made aware of the independence struggle of Puerto Rico. The U.S. imperialists unleashed an intense reign of terror on the people of Puerto Rico. Three thousand people were arrested–including virtually all known members of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, and even many members of the reformist Puerto Rican Independence Party, which had always rejected armed struggle. Police were issued blank arrest warrants to seize anyone they chose. An internationalist Anglo-American, Ruth Reynolds, was seized by the authorities after the historic uprising of Jayuya.
Trials lasted for three years. The hundreds of people on trial were almost all convicted and condemned to prison. In some cases, people were reportedly imprisoned simply because some government spy testified that they had shouted “Viva Puerto Rico Libre!”
One example: The independentista Carlos Feliciano and twelve other people were convicted of killing four cops in Arecibo. Feliciano was sentenced to 465 years in prison. (He later joked, “They thought I was Methuselah.”) A state witness later testified that Feliciano had been in his home town, Mayagüez, when the cops died. And the conviction had to be overthrown. The government refused to release him, but instead set up new charges of “advocating the overthrow of the government” and sentenced him to prison for his views. Membership in the PNP was itself a felony.
The colonialist police, working with the FBI, developed a huge blacklist of independence supporters who were pursued over the coming years. Independentistas, their families and employers were harassed. In 1988, when this blacklist was challenged in court, it contained more than 100,000 files.
The Lie Did Not Go Unopposed
“The Popular Democratic Party desires to have a banana republic with United States air conditioning.”
J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI
The colonial Popular Democratic Party rose to power in the new elections and on July 25, 1952 (again the anniversary of the notorious U.S. invasion!), they and the U.S. proclaimed the so-called Estado Libre Asociado (ELA) or Commonwealth.
This put in place the political arrangement the U.S. has used to exploit and dominate the Puerto Rican people for the last 46 years. Historian Afredo López describes it as “a sophisticated colonial enterprise where everything–laws, administrative organization, even popularly accepted ideology–works toward the efficient exploitation of the land’s natural resources and labor.” This new arrangement set up a phony political system in Puerto Rico that was modeled on electoral politics within the U.S. And based on this set-up, the U.S. pushed through a UN resolution in 1954 that removed Puerto Rico from the official list of “non-self-governing territories.” In other words, the U.S. (and the United Nations) were trying to claim that Puerto Rico was no longer a colony. Puerto Rico independence fighters again took up arms to answer this lie. On March 1, 1954, four Nationalists–Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Irving Flores and Andrés Figueroa Cordero–walked into the gallery of the U.S. Congress and opened fire on the congressmen below. They were in the middle of a debate about immigration, and one politicians had just referred to Mexicans as “wetbacks.” Five congressmen were wounded.
The four independentistas were captured. The attack marked a third proclamation of the free and sovereign Republic of Puerto Rico. 
In prison, Albizu Campos faced intense mistreatment. He accused the authorities of bombarding him with radiation–causing painful illness. Afraid to have him die in prison, the authorities released him, a few months before his death in April 1965. The movement he had built suffered heavily from the ruthless repression of U.S. imperialism. But just as he died, the 1960s were heating up. And a whole new generation all around the world was rising in struggle against U.S. imperialism.
Deeply inspired by Albizu Campos and his fighters, many people, both on the island and on the U.S. mainland, stepped forward to advance the cause of Puerto Rican liberation.
SOURCES:
- Doña Licha’s Island–Modern Colonialism in Puerto Rico, Alfredo López, South End Press, 1987
- Prisoners of Colonialism-the Struggle for Justice in Puerto Rico, Ronald Fernandez, Common Courage Press, 1994
- Puerto Rican Nationalism: A Reader, edited by Jose E. Lopez, Puerto Rican Cultural Center, Chicago, 1977
- Puerto Rico–A Political and Cultural History, Arturo Morales Carrión, Norton, 1983
An early version of this piece appeared in the Revolutionary Worker newspaper in 1998 Published online: December 2007
Available online at mikeely.wordpress.com
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The Puerto Rican Independentistas « Kasama said
[...] Puerto Rico’s Fight for Independence [...]
Topace said
Percentage of votes cast in last election: (2004)
Popular Democratic Party (PDP): 48.4%
New Progressive Party (NPP): 48.2%
Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP): 2.7%
Other: 0.5%
2.7% support for Independence in modern day Puerto Rico.
Linda D. said
In addition: about 2 years ago, in Morelia, Michoacán there was an extremely powerful exhibit–which exhibit traveled around México–of the art (mostly ceramics) and poetry of Carlos Alberto Torres and Oscar Lopez Rivera, who were arrested in the U.S. some years after Lebrón, etc. They had spent 26 and 27 years in prison, respectively, on “seditious conspiracy” charges after prosecutors were unable to charge them with anything else.
The curators replicated an actual cell of these political prisoners (more like a “jaula” (cage)), which you could enter, and all over the 3 walls was much of the poetry written during their incarceration. There was so much interest generated by this exhibit that it was extended, and people brought their entire families to learn more about Puerto Rico and the Independence Movement, etc.
TellNoLies said
My understanding is that the Independence movement is divided and that the PIP represents only one part of it. That doesn’t mean, of course, that independence enjoys the active support of more than a small minority of Puerto Ricans presently. But I imagine that if the people here thought that the present popularity of their own politics was the metric that mattered that we’d all go to the beach instead.
Jaroslav said
Yeah, & another thing is that it really matters what conditions the independence is gained under. Some in PR who are not currently for independence may be aware of this consciously, some subconsciously (& yes, some against independence anyway). As in, who cares about ‘independence’ in quotes?
The Philippines is ‘independent’, but it doesn’t do the people there a lot of good. Or, of course socialism would be good for Ethiopia or Romania or anywhere, but socialism in name only doesn’t mean squat, so why should the people be for ‘socialism’ in name only?
Marx said that the proletariat must make itself fit to rule, through the process of making revolution. That’s the thing with Eastern Europe: in addition to whatever line problems the parties had, they didn’t actually make revolution. They fought against the Nazis (to varying degrees), & then were handed ‘socialism’ on a plate by the USSR. How can one have a revolutionary society, without making revolution? One can’t.
To bring it back to PR, there won’t be any real independence gained through some US-sponsored referendum, there must be a mass struggle. If there is a huge mass struggle, & at some point in that context there is a referendum, well that’s one thing. But right now, although struggle isn’t of course non-existent, this voting booth stuff really doesn’t mean very much.
Mike E said
The fall of the wall, and the blockade-torture of Cuba’s people afterwards, made many Puerto Rican people wary of seeking independence. The U.S. had “made an example of” Cuba.
That doesn’t mean (a ) that Puerto Rican people aren’t a distinct nation (they are), or that (b ) they would not in the main want to be independent.
Elections, held by the U.S. government, under conditions where people are openly threatened with having their social services and pensions abolished (in the case of independence), and held while the neighboring island of Cuba is threatened and isolated for daring to be independent — these are hardly free elections. And the vote for PIP (which was arguing for independence in order to evade U.S. environmental laws etc and so better attract corporate investment) is hardly a sign of the popularity of independence.
American Tortures in the Lexington Women’s Unit 1986-88 « Kasama said
[...] Puerto Rico’s Fight for Independence – Part 1 [...]
Gilbert Flores said
The Spanish were never oppresors since we were been granted autonomy from Spain the year before US Invasion, and were also considered a Province of Spain by that time, either way we were more related to the Spaniards by language, history, family and other interests than to the invading and uninvited US people. Imposing their ways of government when we were already governed by a system much older and more proven than theirs. And about promoting property and prosperity, first thing US people (we are all Americans, from Alaska to Argentina)did was to devaluate our currency so that the people who managed to become wealthy before the invasion, had half or less of that and that way debilitate the ruling economic class and use this as a way to gain more control of the island and it’s riches, but therefore making harder and longer the road to form a strong economical class to improve our economy in favor of their own interests.
Gilbert Flores said
Either way if this relationship with the US does not work (and it seems not to) I do not believe Puerto Rico will go or should go towards independence but back to Spanish Sovereignty as a Province, just as before the invasion, and might as well say as part of a more liberal, efficient, prosperous and less racist European Union.
ronbothunter said
WHEN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT OPPOSES YOUR RIGHT TO BE FREE!!
Puerto Ricans, who desire to be free, must always know that the federal government, here in the States has no “subject matter jurisdiction” over the person, case or location and should be challenged to proof it.
You won’t be told this in court but: All jury members, judges, attorneys, and employees working in federal court, must reside in federal territory to legally be a federal juror or touch your case or they can be commercially sued, disbarred and financially ruined for violating your constitutional rights etc.
Your god given right to be free is not wanted by the USA, it will oppose your desire for independence and freedom.
The USA has been the biggest alien invaders the world has ever known. In order to win your freedom you must oppose them by knowing that their weakness lies in the Constitution and the common law and common law remedies.
To win –You must always reserve your constitutional, commercial rights and know what they are.
The majority of Anglos have no idea that the USA has killed more Latinos, than Hitler Killed Jews, The USA has supported traitors, Gringitos, Butchers, Sociopaths, and Megalomaniacs who were supported and kept in power by sucking up to the Anglo Alien Invaders.
Latin America has had enough of this form of genocide of Latinos. That includes other African, Asian etc. countries that lost millions of innocent people from USA aggression.
I want to vomit every time some ignorant fools says: “If you don’t like it here –go home”.
If the Alien Invaders would get out of each and every Latin Country and stop interfering in our affairs—it would make sense to say such a stupid thing. But unless the Snakes get out of Latin America-we have just as much right to be here!!! So, grin and put up with it—this was once our land.
A Puerto Rican without a desire for independence and/or freedom from alien control has no soul of a man.
The fact that the public does not know that we are NOT free, makes no difference, to the desire to be free. The PR that wants Statehood is a Gringito, who has no soul of a man left in his traitor’s heart. Freedom is happening all over the world and yet we allow Gringitos to kill our right to be free.
A Gringito is a non-Anglo thing/person who internally is so inferior, that he desires to be what he can not be—thus Gringito means little gringo.
We allow the Alien Invaders to kill, harm, abuse, rape, and scam us and yet the Gringito wants to give our Country away.
This abuse must end. No man or woman is a real Man or real woman who is too scared to fight for their souls and be free. If you listen to the Gringito, you will lose your soul.
Thru out eternity Humanity owes its freedom from slavery, ONLY to brave souls who fought for your right to be free.
The fight will NOT succeed if you don’t fight the Gringito enemy at home first. He is there next door and claims he is a real man and tries to give you many excuses of why PR can’t be a free Country.
The fight for the independence of Puerto Rico is now non-violent and will be won in the hearts of real men around the World.
The Ronbothunter,
A proud freedom loving Puerto Rican.
All Rights Reserved
Don Matsuda said
As a US citizen of Okinawan descent I support the struggles of the peoples of Puerto Rico, Hawaii, and Okinawa against the military takeover of their lands.
jp said
Daniel Ortega at the OAS conference in April 09:
“There are two representatives missing here today,” Ortega said Friday. “They’re absent from this meeting. One is Cuba whose crime has been that of fighting for independence, fighting for sovereignty of the peoples. Cuba who’s crime has been to offer solidarity without any conditions, with out conditions to our peoples. And just because of that they’re punished they’re penalized. Another people that is not here present because, different from the case of Cuba, and independent nation.
“This other people is still subjected to the colonialist policies and I’m talking about the sister nation of Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico. And the day will come when Latin American and Caribbean peoples, as is already happening … where in that huge alliance we’ll have the people of Puerto Rico, I’m convinced the day will come, the day will come,”
Emmanuel Caceres said
No statehood for Puerto Rico only indenpendence and I know Puerto Rico could become an strong country along with it’s flag which is a perfect match.
william brinsdon said
I,m not real sure why all you Puerto Ricans are upset, or what the U.S. has done to u or your country,I say your country ,which is a bit confusing,cause your here and its there. But either way we all live in God,s world,and if this problem u have is hurting your heart,I will be praying 4 you,that this problem or heartache will not stand in the way of your relationship with your Father God.but either way this is a problem on your heart, I feel 4 you. and if you can consider my heart brother,this is the country I live in ,I LOVE IT. I believe there are traders in washington, trying to take my country and our freedoms. We all have to live somewhere,PuertoRico,US,Mexico, where ever you live ,we still have to live in this world Together. John 15 Jesus says to love each other, therfore I love brother ,Puerto Ricans,Mexicans,Canadians,Muslims, Christian,Jews, . I will pray 4 you,,,you pray 4 me.
may God be in your home and in your heart
william brinsdom
ricans
nando said
william writes:
The answer is not complicated, william: The U.S. conquered puerto rico with an invasion. And has held the island under colonial dominaiton with all the economic, military and police power of an imperial power.
Does that answer your questions?
Quintin Cruz said
FUCK AMERIKKKA
La isla imposible said
Mike, while I generally agree with a lot of what you say on this site, I think your understanding of the complexity of Puerto Rican history is seriously lacking. For someone who consistentlt argues that communists need to be in tune with the complexity of the real world in order to carry out revolution, this is no small flaw. And I think it has to do in part with the literature that, as a US leftist, you’ve been exposed to, which is produced mostly by Puerto Rican academics and nationalists.
While many of these have been valuable comrades in the struggle against imperialism in the past, and some, as I said in a previous comment about Lolita Lebrón, are genuinely committed revolutionaries, that does not mean either, a)that they currently have any political relevance in revolutionary struggles in Puerto Rico, or b) that their version of history is of any use to Puerto Rican communists (or our US allies) in understanding and revolutionizing our situation.
As an avid Kasama “lurker”, I’ve been playing for a long time with the idea of producing a full-length analytical and theoretical piece on the history of the complex relationship between Puerto Rico’s class and national liberation struggles, as a sort of “primer” for US-based allies. I just haven’t found the time yet. In the meantime, here’s some food for thought on several points in this particular essay and its comment thread:
1. The sugar cane strike of 1934 was not, and could hardly be, a “peasant” uprising. The really-existing jíbaros (an originally derogatory term used for rural folk in general, regardless of class) of that time were by and large agro-industrial wage earners, and their demands, organizations, and forms of struggle were all recognizably working class. Independence was not one of the demands of that struggle.
It is true that the workers were abandoned by their traditional leadership (which had achieved electoral success in the colonial system through an alliance with the sugar burgeoisie), providing a leadership vacuum into which Albizu and the Nationalists were invited. However, the “fusion” between the Nationalists and the workers, and the strike itself, were largely failures because of the Nationalists’ elitist, petit-bourgeois notions of organization and leadership (Albizu appointed a dentist to lead the Nationalist Workers’ “Association”!)
2. Elections in Puerto Rico are not “run” by the US. They are run by a local elections board that is controlled by the ruling New Progressive and Popular Democratic parties, and to a lesser degree, the PIP, but are not subject to federal law. In fact, elections in Puerto Rico, although far from perfect, tend to be more transparent than in most US states.
This is of course not to legitimize a system that is designed to perpetuate the capitalist and colonial status quo, and which has more “legal” safeguards against, than genuine opportunities for, popular participation. But understanding the situation in which and against which we are struggling also implies being clear on what that entails, and being honest with ourselves.
3. The propagandized negative example of Cuba is hardly the main reason Puerto Ricans don’t vote for independence (by the way, the PIP may be a petit-bourgeois social democratic electoral party, but by no means has it demonstrated in practice that it seeks independence to “evade” environmental laws, etc.; on the contrary, it has consistently been a major voice in favor of environmental protection, above and beyond existing regulations). If there is a relevant negative example today, it is the Dominican Republic, whose standard of living in the early 20th century was arguably higher than Puerto Rico’s.
The fact of the matter is is that since the 1950s, US imperialism in Puerto Rico has pursued a strategy that some have called “modern colonialism” and is similar to that pursued by the French and Dutch in their remaining Caribbean possessions. That strategy was geared in part to offsetting Cuba’s revolutionary example (sorry, China wasn’t even on the radar of Puerto Ricans until the early ’70s, and then only for a handful of people), in part to creating a tax haven for US corporations (no longer useful since the ’90s), and in part (since the mid-’70s) toward stimulating credit and aid-driven consumption to favor US banks.
Its contradictory effect was the dramatic increase in the standard of living of the majority of the population, which combined with the the spectacular selling out of the petit-bourgeois nationalists and the labor movement leadership after the fall of the wall, as well as the blunders and general inefficacy of the “real” left (not unlike the situation in the US), has been catastrophic for the independence movement.
4. (and this is perhaps my main and most controversial point)… the “major contradiction” in Puerto Rico is not between the US and the Puerto Rican nation, but between (mostly US, but also Puerto Rican and increasingly international) transnational financial and commercial capital, and Puerto Rican wage-earners (“blue-collar”, “white-collar”, and no-collar).
THERE’s the rub…
La isla imposible said
…scratch that, not “Puerto Rican wage-earners”, but wage-earners and the oppressed in general. One of the main differences between a revolutionary communist and a nationalist understainding of the struggle is about the role of (mostly Dominican) immigrants. Our position is that immigrant workers are an integral part of the oppresed masses.
Mike E said
LII writes:
First, I thank you for sharing your criticisms. I hope to learn from the points you raise.
I have no doubt that I have much to learn about the history of Puerto Rico — nor do I doubt my now-twelve-year-old essays may contain evaluations or formulations about events and forces that may prove incorrect.
These essays were quickly written, werre not based on deep personal involvement with either the theoretical or pratical work of Puerto Rico’s liberation — and they inevitably reflect the outlook and assumptions of the movement I was then part of. And this movement tended, with real grandiosity, then and now, to overestimate its own ability to understand complex things from afar.
It is hard to deny that my understanding is informed by (and may be mislead by) the materials I have found available. I look forward to hearing your criticisms in real detail.
And I am particularly curious to unravel what are differences of fact and what are differences of line and analysis In my experience, differences often first appear as disagreements over matters of “fact,” and then (on examination) reveal themselves to be matters of line.
For example: Class analysis of cane-cutters as workers or peasants is not simply a factual matter, but also a matter of important line distinctions. A different theoretical assessment of rural laborers earning wages is one of the major historical differences between Maoism (which has often viewed them as “landless peasants”) on the one hand, and (on the other hand) both Trotskyism and Castroism, which tended to view such laborers as “rural proletarians.”It has to do with the applicability of agrarian revolution in those struggles, with whether the goal in such situations is breaking up plantations (land to the tiller) or socializing them directly (as post-revolutionary state farms). It has to do with evaluations of the Cuban revolution and its path, etc. And it is a matter that is not (fundamentally) resolved in a dispute over definitions — but a very practical exploration of historical context of the land questions, how the specific workers are actually exploited, and how they are connected to the larger world of commodity exchange.
Another example: Whether elections in Puerto Rico are colonial elections… and the implications of that for strategy (abstention or participation). I am interested to learn the details you are raising about how, precisely, these elections are organized and controlled. But here too need to inject the line question that the colonial nature of such elections is not simply determined by the aparatus and personnel that directly administer the voting, but the overall context: including the basic fact that partisans of Puerto Rican independence have been hunted down and murdered, and the fact that many people have been made depenendent of U.S.-signed pensions and checks (and the withdrawal of such things is injected by the imperialists into any discussion of independence). In other words, the question of whether these are “colonial elections” is a larger matter of context than simply administration. (Though here too I am eager to learn from those, like you, who have given a great deal more thought and time into unraveling these contradictions.)
Finally, these articles are aging. they are twelve years old. An analysis of PIP based on documents then, might well be contradicted by practice since (as your example of environmental questions suggests.) Puerto Rico has gone through a lot of changes since the first time I traveled through the newly mechanized pineapple and sugarcane fields — the proletarianization of life has deepened in profound ways, the close connection between island and mainland has gone through generational shifts, rise and fall of independence sentiments have had their impact, and more.
Even if we discover that the issues you have to raise are mainly questions of line — I look forward to listening and learning, and don’t assume that my own previous understandings are correct.
Are you going to elaborate more, here, on this thread, this week?
Do it.
We would all love to read such a piece. And obviously, this site would be eager to offer space for promoting and engaging it.
Thanks.
La isla imposible said
I agree that the question of “rural proletarians” vs. “landless peasants” is one of line. It’s a debate a look forward to developing and having. I obviously lean more towards the former. However, I also agree that it’s more a question of “practical exploration of historical context” than definitions. Part of the reason that I brought it up as the first point is that I intentionally want to challenge the sort of mechanical assumption (which I know you have yourself questioned) that the maoist line about “semi-feudal” and “semi-colonial” contexts (i.e. people’s war) is, or was at some point in the past, applicable to Puerto Rico.
This is a view that I think is implicit in the analysis of many of the Puerto Rican armed groups of the ’70s and ’80s, and in some way, whether conscious or not, repeated in your twelve-year old essay. By the way, I’m aware of how dated it is, and that you are conscious of the fact… part of what I want to do is to stimulate some discussion about conditions NOW, and how they may be related to conditions and questions of strategy in the US.
The full-length piece may be a while in coming, as I’m in the middle of several major personal transitions. But I will comment periodically (if coaxed into doing so by thoughtful replies).
In the meantime, here’s something I think may be a treat for fellow kasamites:
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/puertorico/PR-Peoples-War.pdf
It’s a pamphlet from the late ’70s by a PR solidarity organization that included, among others, the STO, which includes communiquès by the diverse PR armed organizations of the time.
jp said
I’d also like to hear more on this. PR needs some deep and freethinking examination; it’s quite a special case.
From afar, I think the best course to steer would be an alliance with Caribbean and Spanish-speaking nations, an expanded ALBA, and away from the wreckage of the USA – but that’s far off the horizon. What is to be done in Puerto Rico?
nando said
I would like to hear a discussion about independence itself.
We have all supported independence for Puerto Rico. The people there have been exploited, brutalized and deprived of self-determination. And Puerto Rico is not an “internal nation” (like the African American people) — but an external people who were directly conquered and dominated by force of arms.
At the same time, Puerto Rico’s people have the final say on whether they choose independence or not — and it is not clear to me what the actual politics around this is among Puerto Rican people themselves. And what they are likely to become in future moments of crisis and opportunity. What impact on Puerto Rican politics is felt from the many ties that now exist between the island and the mainland (ties of family, experience, and economics)?
jp said
of course the puerto rican people have the say – but how to try to affect that decision? under what circumstances can they choose? what aletrnatives do they envision (or are allowed to envision)?
it might be claimed as well that the people of the USA chose obama, but that can’t be a step forward (despite the obama-tailing line promoted successfully by progressives). the human smoke emanating from the obamaproject tells the story.
my understanding is that the independentistas are marginalized at this point. The student strike at UPR campuses, which got no traction on US campuses, was really inspiring, and a great antidote to passivity. I’d really like to hear from some people on the island about how that’s being followed up. the globalvoices online website has had some excellent coverage.
La isla imposible said
Short answers to some of the key points touched upon by Nando and Jp:
No, the great majority of Puerto Ricans do not currently support independence,
No, that has not always been historically the case,
Yes, that may change in the not-so-distant future, and
Yes, revolutionary communists can and absolutely must work for this to happen.
The whys to the first two answers are complex, and are rooted in history. I hope to spend some time on them in the near future.
The third why is also complex. In a nutshell, the model of the modern colonial state that I have briefly described is in the throes of a deep crisis (closely tied to the global crisis). Current popular support for the decrepit status quo is, as Zizek tells us of capitalist democracy, cynical at best. Deteriorating conditions may and probably will lead to an increased support for statehood. But PR statehood is an impossibility that huckster politicians use as a carrot to get votes, which US Congress would reject in a heartbeat. So it’s an impasse that only liberation can break.
The last why is simple: because as a colony Puerto Rico has and will continue to be a springboard for US imperialism, especially in Latin America; because colonialism seriously impairs the possibilities for further revolutionary struggle in Puerto Rico; and because national self-determination is a right of peoples, just as much as revolution is.
As for the impact of ties to the US on PR politics, and what’s currently going on at the UPR, I’ll go into both in some detail in a future installment.
jp said
thanks for the insights, isla – looking forward to hearing more.
sks said
I must nuance and perhaps dissent from Isla’s views on the colonial crisis in Puerto Rico being related to the global one.
While of course the global crisis does affect Puerto Rico, there is an independent tendency in economic de-development in Puerto Rico that began in the 70s oil crisis, and the subsequent macro-economic decisions made by the local government, and by the colonial administrations.
This tendency has had ups-and-downs in classic boom-bust fashion, but since the late 1990s has become all bust.
We can divide it in three waves:
1) 70s oil crisis, which resulted in the losing of the bet the government had made in large-scale petrochemical refinery production centered around that state-owned Caribbean Oil Refinery Corporation (CORCO). Until then PR had ridden a wave of generosity from the US that meant not only entitlements, but significant direct macroeconomic investment in the form of subsidies, corporate investment (often as a loss leader), and other monies meant for the colonial project of turning Puerto Rico as a showcase for Pan-Americanist welfare state ideology – the economic component of what the “Commonwealth” meant politically. When this crisis hit, both that waning generosity and the bet meant to replace it were destroyed. This crisis meant that for the first time in PR’s history the state sector laid-off workers, and there was a recession in the private sector. By the mid-1980s a surge in the finance and construction sector, well-managed such as not to create a housing speculation bubble, gave the impression of a recovery. So did an increasy of light industry and the technology sectors, fueled by the PC revolution, a decent engineering public college, and tax incentives.
2) Late 80s, early 1990s. Yet the financial crisis that hit the USA during the Bush I regime put lie to the miracle – the dependency in essentially non-productive private sectors tied to each other (finance and construction) and on industries already moving to greener Asian pastures created a longer recessionary period in Puerto Rico than in the USA. It was during this period that the government first attempted to privatize the public sectors corporations as a way to pay off debt and increase the temporary bond rating for capital projects, mostly infrastructure (which would help the construction sector recuperate). The crisis rebounded thanks to the Clinton era financial sector rebound, and the ability of the government to get large numbers of bonds for their projects without needing much re-structuring, or promising this restructuring later.
3) The late 90s to present. In 1992, a pro-Statehood governor of neo-liberal, rather than keynesian persuasion won. His first four years were marked by relative quiet, as a more or less popular private single payer health system was implemented to replace the previous public health system. Behind the scenes, significant changes to the makeup of Puerto Rico’s economy were being made, both reasons of corruption and ideologically motivated neo-liberal models “that fit the USA better”. But upon re-election in 1996 all of this became open warfare. By the end of the decade, many public corporations were either privatized, closed, or semi-privatized, including the healthy Telephone Company. This created a short-term credit boost, but the loss of collateral significantly diminished the ability of future governments to secure cheap credit. Coupled to this aggressive program of dismantling the welfare state, all the agricultural subsidies were significantly reduced, at the same time a hurricane in 1998 made it prohibitive to rebuild lost farms (this has led to a curious condition were PR, which harbors great land for plantain production, is a net importer of plantains). More importantly, all tax incentives for industry other than tourism were eliminated or reduced significantly (Puerto Rico spends so much in tourism promotion that it almost matches the net contribution of tourism to the economy!) – this led to massive layoffs as plants after plant closed to go to other places. Then the dotcom financial collapse and the 9/11 attacks generated a USA-wide crisis – so there was no buffer.
This current crisis is a structural crisis of colonialism: the dependency of the welfare state colony clashed with the dependency of a statehood project to generate a perfect storm of deindustrialization, deagriculturalization, construction sector stoppage and credit crisis. Puerto Rico today is not able to support itself without the drug economy, which has not always been the case: the drug economy sustained a level of luxury, but was not essential.
I do not share Isla’s optimism regarding independence, although I do agree with his analysis in the main. I fear Puerto Rico is on the road to becoming a narco-democracy, and an independent Puerto Rico in those conditions would mean civil war, a civil war which the left is ill equipped to fight, politically, theoretically, structurally, militarily in any effective way.
There is a way out for the USA, which is free association of the type they are engaged with a number of the Pacific colonies. It would allow them to switch funding from the domestic to the foreign aid budgets, but also allow the USA to accept a narco-democracy, as they do with Colombia.
jp said
sks and isla, while i don’t have a lot to contribute on this (i’m learning here), i hope the discussion proceeds. the puerto rican sense of being a people, the greater militancy of certain sectors (evidenced by the student strike and the earlier, large anti-government demos) combined with the simple fact of the island’s small size give me some optimism that they may find a way forward. not an easy way, of course.
La isla imposible said
@sks:
where exactly is my “sense of optimism regarding independence”? what i actually said on this matter is:
No, the great majority of Puerto Ricans do not currently support independence,
No, that has not always been historically the case,
Yes, that may change in the not-so-distant future
that may change at some undetermined point in the future. i then go on to explain, in an extremely condensed way, why this may be the case.
none of it – not the actual cite, not the explanation – precludes your doomsday scenario of “narco-democracy” (which i in fact believe is not “on its way”, but currently existing) and civil war, although i must admit the latter suggestion is far-fetched to say the least.
you know (very well) that my conception of actually-attainable independence involves a long process of working-class mobilization and pre-revolutionary struggle under deteriorating material conditions.
the probability of civil war, at least at the pre-revolutionary stage, however, on an island with (increasingly) limited rural expanses, zero history of armed (non-insurrecctional) factionalism, virtually no remaining conflicting feudal or even semi-feudal classes, and no professional standing army of its own, is close to nil.
more likely -in a much deteriorated situation – is a jamaica-style standoff between urban narco-guerrillas and equally narco-financed state forces. but while this may be an obstacle to the growth of revolutionary politics, it is also a possibility highly unrelated to the so-called status issue.
in fact, the emergence of a radical working-class led popular movement increasingly oriented towards national liberation as a result of increasing clashes with US imperialism, the colonial state, and its rotten micro-bourgeoisie may indeed even help to derail this possibility.
La isla imposible said
while i get around to actually producing and delivering the promised theoretical-analytical piece on the puerto rican situation, this might be a good starting point for discussing the ideological context in which the struggle for independence takes place (or fails to):
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36434100/Political-Imagination-Cultural-Community-The-Story-of-Puerto-Rican-Nationalism
it was written 5 or 6 year ago for a graduate course, and some of the thinking in it is dated. but a lot of it i think is accurate, and the historical references may (hopefully) be useful.
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Kasama said
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[...] Rican political prisoner Oscar López Rivera. Kasama has published articles previously on the independence movement for Puerto Rico and injustice of jailing those who fight for the island’s liberation. Share this petition, and [...]
laUnica verdad said
Los Puertorriquenos traicionaron a su patria y a los Lideres como Albizu Campos al NO respaldarlos. Todos son unos traidores a su propia Patria que los vio nacer! Se vendieron por dinero al Gringo invasor!
cigar guy said
At the risk of dating myself and exposing how out of touch I am, what became of the PSP (PR Socialist Party)?
Or was it PSWP? I remember them from the 1970′s as a minority party in PR, but seemingly the dominant revolutionary force in PR with a base here in the states that was for independence.
Mike E said
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puerto_Rican_Socialist_Party
cigar guy said
Thanks for the update, Mike.
drpridex19 said
hey uh.. just asking, what do puerto rican natives think about independence and does everyone support them. I hear that there are also other political parties, like the puerto rican party of statehood and the puerto rican party for common wealth(which means to stay as it is being nor state nor independent)
i wanted to know what a puerto rican native would have to say about the topic.?
Milestones: Kasama passes 3.5 million « Kasama said
[...] Puerto Rico’s Fight for Independence [...]
GARXIA said
All
It is so interesting to read documented and educated oppinions about freedom and citizenship in general, starting with Purto Ricos independence movement. So glad to see this type of forums, regardless of personnal oppinion on the matter. As a Mexican born, I consider latinamerican relationship with USA so complex that, including time dimension and society evoultion mixed with generational “get used to” factor is not a fair analysis for pro independence movement or “prostatusquo”.
Not talking about people, but assigning a personality to governments, it is obvious that egocentrism at some level plays a role in expansionism spirit in USA actions since nation inception. Forced agreement on spaniards and smart war strategies from USA invasion, while “free souls” and consistent latinamerican brotherhood and solidarity provide origin and current value on topic. Not that I propose an utopia or
Lets face it, Family links are preserved if independence is provided/achieved, just paperwork and formalization is required, economy as an independent country prevails as local power is stronger per capita than other caribean nations. Puerto ricans have earned USA citizenship as any inmigrant in US soil recognized by their governments has, while most migrants are still in the dark (Do not misunderstand me please, I am not pulling topic towards Mexico, I am just using the example) That is a right earned, as an associated state as it is recognized, while from my perspective, a nation can make any agreements with another nation on their populations behalf. Now, with current delivery of soveregnity to other country, PR is not a fully acting nation
PR was a province of Spain, same as Mexico, so on Paris it just moved from one country to another, loosing the cultural link to mother nation Spain. Finally, the issue os not the military base or the existance of a right to assume other countrys nationality, but issue is if the island is a Nation by itself or not. So, forces pro and against indepencdence tend to loose ground when time consumes most of the citizens potential interest in a change to the sttsquo. What cannot be denied whatsoever, is that Puerto Rico deserves to be a nation with same levels of rights as Dominicana, Haiti and Cuba, and USA expansionism does not provide a right unilaterally as it is assumed on the Guano act, where uninhabited islands where just absorbed. PR would not loose the right to decide again on its future if it was part of the decolonization program by UN as it was a colony/province and it was absorbed by another power. Decolonization cannot be used only for europowers, as ameropowers have expanded too without the regions consent (Even inside Latinamerica with Brasil representing expansion and neighbors ceding regions), or ask Guatemalans and Soconusco and Belize are still counted as we in Mexico count Clipperton or some US states.
jp said
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/02/us/02fernandez.html?scp=1&sq=ronald+fernandez&st=cse
RIP Ronnie Fernanadez
Emmanuel Caceres said
Puerto Rico should win their freedom.
mad poet said
I am Puertorican. Personally, I think PR should be a free and independent nation. However, most PRs do not want independence but the reasons are complex, rooted in a colonial mentality as well as a grasp of realpolitik in the Caribbean. Cuba has been mentioned and no one in PR wants to go that way. While independentistas garner a lot of respect, most people think the ties to the US (there are now more PRs in the US than on the island) will always continue and, as so many have fought in US wars and are veterans or children of veterans, or have deep ties to NYC, Orlando, Chicago, Philadelphia, etc., the thinking is that those ties are pretty much irrevocable. So that is why there is a vacillation between those who favor statehood and those who favor a continuation of the status quo. Probably 5-10% would support independence AT MOST should a completely free and open referendum be held. So the question is, what is the best solution? Seems to me that allowing PRs who live in the US (with at least one parent born on the island) be given a vote but even that is controversial in PR and no small obstacle (and they — those who live in the US–are more inclined to vote for independence). In addition, the language is crucial to identity and should statehood be chosen, many fear the gradual dissolution of Spanish. Lastly, the local politicos are so entrenched in a culture of hyper-bureaucratization that people are tired of politics and the internecine conflicts that cause people to defend their turf and so to simplify the issue into a collection of slogans and politically correct but unconnected to the actual people or “facts on the ground” is foolhardy.
SKS said
@Mad poet
I am Puerto Rican too. I think you are talking a whole lot of crap about being for a “free and independent nation”. That imperialism has managed to create an untenable situation, and that the Puerto Rican Nation is largely diasporic is no excuse to abandon the struggle for national liberation – and in the particular case of Puerto Rico this struggle has to be bound for a struggle against capitalism and for socialism. That is the only alternative – socialism.
More and more people everyday realize this – but unfortunately there exists a layer of people like you, the melones and the populetes, who claim to be for independence, but in argument and action actually advocate colonialism. This swath is large, up to a quarter in some polls – which is as large as those who support statehood on principle.
This is not a space to make an extensive analysis of this question, but in my view that layer of so-called pro-independence people who nevertheless support colonialism do so because they fear socialism – independence under capitalist conditions is untenable. This is an unfounded fear but also a class fear: most of this layer are also in the classes that benefit directly from colonial capitalism. Such bankrupt nationalism (in contrast to the revolutionary nationalism of Albizu-Campos) is why we are stuck in colonial limbo.
It is high time to put aside such desperation and advocate independence clearly and without fear. Or admit you are not for Independence and get out of the way.
mad poet said
If hyperbole and ad hominem attacks were revolutionarily effective, we´d be living in a socialist paradise now. Grow up.
This IS the place to discuss and if you don´t want to–or can´t–then simply ignore the post. I am a socialist and a Puertorican in favor of independence but there will be no socialist revolution there–or in the US–in my lifetime and the fact remains that most PRs don´t want one. One reason is that they face the same kind of bitterness you throw out and they want better. Like laughter, and joy, like hope and freedom. Capitalism doesn´t do that, but the kind of “socialism” they see coming out of the mouths of firebrands like yourself doesn´t appeal either. That is not an abandonment of anything, nor is it support for colonialism, it is simply facing reality.
Now, what do you do with reality? I´ve paid my dues and continue to labor with kind regard for the workers and the people who suffer under the present system. But it will be the goodness of socialists, their honest and decent commitment to the people, their advocacy of community and true solidarity that will win the people over.
Mike E said
[moderator note: the differences exchanged here between SKS and Mad Poet are important and substantive. Please tone down the personalization of this exchange.]
SKS said
@Mad poet
My apologies for the personalist feel – but this is deeply personal as well as political: Puerto Rico has been suffering throught one of the worse neo-liberal policies in the world, its agriculture wiped out in a generation, its light industry shipped elsewhere, its political class beholden to narco-capitalists. Socialism and Independence are the only way out.
There is a difference between realizing that a task is hard – and it is hard – and shying away from this task, or considering routes that circumvent this path. Your post went into some details that are questionable (5-10% for independence? nah, its more like 25-30% according to polling).
The PIP has a lot of failings, but one of them is not their absolutely correct line on independence being relevant, and the necessity of advocating directly for it.
Now, I think their bets, placed on the labor aristocracy and the petty bourgeois are ill placed, and it is interesting that since the commonwealth came in to being, and not counting the 1952 election (in which even Statehooders votes for them as a protest to PPD hegemony and the weakness of the Statehooder Republican Party), the two best elections for the PIP have been the ones in which socialism was at the forefront of their slogans. In particular, the success of 1972, which the PIP Youth marched to electoral victory with Ho Chi Minh as their flag and “Up with those from the bottom!” (“Arriba los de abajo”) as a slogan- and whose expulsion crippled the PIP forever.
The Puertorican national liberation movement is as sectarian as any movement in the world, yet it is essentially divided in two large camps: the camp that sees the crisis of independence and seeks to transform their politics as one against statehood – melones, populetes, and lately even self-described socialists of the MAS – and those who are for independence period, with no fear. The difference is not subtle: often behind the “realism” hides the strategic designs of the Puerto Rican union bureaucracy in the USA, for whom independence would break the power base they have built inside the Democrats, and often lies a conformity with the status quo: they prefer the peace of the colonial status and the certainty of crisis to the strife of revolution and uncertain future.
I fall firmly in the latter, and have little patience with those who hide behind “realistic” approaches to promote counter-revolutionary politics: there is one solution to this crisis, which is to build fighting organizations of the working class and the oppressed. Everything else is either counterproductive (PIP) or treason (PPT, MUS, MINH etc).
When I said this is not the place, I mean this is a comments thread, often not the best medium for long discussions. If you want to have one, however I will happily do so.
mad poet said
OK, apology accepted.
Still, we disagree on several points.
First, I agree with you that independence is the best, and preferable option, but I disagree that,
“Everything else is either counterproductive (PIP) or treason (PPT, MUS, MINH etc).”.
That kind of reductionist thinking leaves no room for change or growth on the part of those with whom we might disagree with now but who may move to “our side” later, and corners them instead into a perpetual “enemy” status which in turn, goes against the very grain of our attempts to win over the working classes into an awareness they may not have now about which way forward.
Re: “realism”. I am a realist. I do not think, nor believe, and, frankly, have given up hoping for a “revolution” in my lifetime. It won´t happen no matter how much you want it to. I am too old to argue about that one, and won´t, so all appeals to the contrary will fall upon deaf ears. That is NOT to say I am “hiding” behind this attitude, or that I do not fight for socialist idea(l)s or that I “refer the peace of the colonial status quo.” You mentioned the years when support was high and the last year you mentioned was 1972.
1972.
That was almost 40 years ago.
No one I know who lives in PR, nor maybe more than 5% of those elsewhere think PR could survive as an independent nation. They know the history of the US in Cuba, know their own history, and have complicated, often conflicting relations with their own relationships to the US. Things are complex. They love PR, retain tremendous respect for their own (my own) culture, and accept that the
“the strife of revolution and uncertain future”
which you advocate, is NOT where they wish to spend their energy. They want safety, security, jobs for their kids, a future for their families and a better life. Acknowledging that is where we must begin. Ignoring that is what is really counterproductive.
The world is NOT black and white, and recognizing that fact, is the beginning of growth, from which we can then realistically assess what IS possible, and then work tirelessly for that. And I will not get into a “reformist” argument either. I was in PR recently, talked to many people there, have my whole family still there (many of whom fought for independence in the 50s, 60s and 70s) and the rates of support you mention are nothing I have ever heard or seen. Most polls are LOWER than what I said (see original article for the typical 2-5%) but I believe that is easily doubled but steady around there. 30% would be fabulous, but people want no more guns, no more drugs, no more violence and no more violent rhetoric. Reach out to them if you like–I do–but do it with a true measure of love for them where they are not where you want them to be and you will convince more people than telling them they need to struggle more. Our people are struggling plenty right now.
SKS said
1) I believe the temr reductionist (which we should never use) is being used incorrectly – sometimes, a line is the sand is needed. If you notice, I am not advocating – and I could – any specific organic vision of socialism and independence. That could be called reductionist.
2) You do raise an interesting and valid point: how should the pro-Independence movement approach those who are not for independence. This a question minority political movements for change have always grappled with – even in the USA, up until Lexington and Concord forced war, most of the forces in the Continental Congress were not for independence – and in fact a tiny fraction left to become Loyalists as war broke out. History teaches us that it is the historical correctness of political positions – not its strength at a given period – which determines the eventual success or lack of success of a given position. Among some communists the question has been more or less resolved in the abstract by the theory of the mass line: unite the advance (ie those who are firmly on your side) with the intermediate (those in the fence or who are in part with you) against the backward (those completely against you). This has played out in actual Puerto Rican politics as struggle around what are the advance and intermidiate, historically in three distinct fashions:
a) The advance are those for Independence
b) The advance are those with progressive or left wing politics, regardless of position on status
c) The advance are socialists for Independence
The intermediate on the other hand has been defined as:
a) those who are patriotic and cultural nationalists
b) those who oppose statehood, regardless what form
c) the working class as a whole, with little help from the other classes
Once, the largest electoral party in Puerto Rico was Statehooder, Socialist Party with deep roots in the working class. This happened a long time ago, sure, but the fact that while the forces and numbers change, the debate has mostly remained the same.
3) The great Italian communist Antonio Gramsci once said that we needed pessimism of the mind but optimism of the will. I subscribe fully to this view. You don’t, for the reasons you state – I find them pessimism of the will and not just of the mind. If this were an individual thing, it could be forgiven, but it isn’t. It is the collective believe and strategic motivation of most of the self-described Independence advocates. And even then it could be forgiven, if it weren’t for the fact that the actions this pessimism leads to are to administer the colony for fear of Statehood, including the neo-liberal policies that have struck the island as so much hurricanes. It is a political and economic Katrina, year in and year out, bought to you by Popular Inc, and called “a strategy for sovereignty” by the deluded and/or cynical (but mostly cynical) leadership of the “realists”.
4) You say:
Putting aside you called it a personal attack when I pointed out this very fact (because well, this is not the first time I have seen people argue what you argue and its like a script), lets address its substance.
I agree that people want “safety, security, jobs for their kids, a future for their families and a better life”. I will say that applies not just in Puerto Rico, but the rest of the world. However, how does colonialism deliver these things? It doesn’t.
So this line of reasoning begs the question: since independence is unrealistic, and advocating independence alienates the good hardworking people, what is the alternative? The colony!
I do not ignore that reality, but struggle with it politically: I advocate the patient explanation of the material reality of Puerto Rico to Puertorricans, and the self-organization of the working class to lead us to national liberation and socialism. Because only national liberation and socialism can deliver “safety, security, jobs for their kids, a future for their families and a better life”. And the quicker we stop lying to ourselves and thinking otherwise, the quicker we will move towards that goal.
And I do not advocate revolution out of some lyrical romanticism. I simply accept it is the necessary and inevitable outcome of the struggle for national liberation and socialism. As the great National poet and communist revolutionary Commander Juan Antonio Corretjer once said: the objective of revolutionary war is socialist peace. Unlike him, I do not relish in this fact, war is very ugly, revolutionary war is uglier. Yet, when nearly four people a day dying of gunshot wounds for a few dollars of cocaine money as the police seem to exist only to smash the heads of the opposition (the murder rate in Puerto Rico is on par with Sudan, whose southern province just became a new country after wagng a war of independence, a war in which less people per capita died than people in Puerto Rico without the war for independence).
To your realism, I bring you a real realism: to continue the present course will result in hundreds of thousands more unemployed migrating to the USA, tens of thousands more falling into poverty, thousands more dying in the civil war over the drug trade, and hundreds giving up any hope and dying of suicide. The situation is desperate – it is no longer the old Puerto Rico, in which the state capitalist colony at least put shoes in people’s feet, in which independence was a romantic idea only a few embraced. Independence and socialism today are the only alternative.
5) I do not believe in black and white – however, I do believe in dialectics, which is different from a fuzzy logic of indefinition. Betances once said that to want to be free was to begin to be free – yet he also asked with melancholy: what are the Puertoricans doing that they don’t rise up? Unfortunately, today, we neither want to be free – so we cannot even begin to be free
6) I was born and raised in Puerto Rico until quite into my 20s. I will say this: your informats in the island are either delusional or have no idea what they are talking about. The old joke goes that the difference between a Statehooder and a Independence advocate is a six-pack of beer!
As to polling:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/07/14/994703/-Puerto-Rico:-new-political-status-poll-(to-be-or-not-to-be!)
That is a poll from March 2011, the most recent one I could find. It doesn’t, of course, show the support for independence I speak of (20%-30%). It is a solid 7% with 11% “undecided or do not vote”. 39% for some formula of commonwealth, 43% for statehood.
What is interesting in this poll, is that it is not about parties, but positions.
This is also interesting: 33% oppose referendums. This is what I call the independence core: these are the people who are truly afraid of statehood, whose marriage to the USA is one of convenience, and which can be won over with a consistent independentista work to an open position.
Other polls shows the above 34% to have strong overlaps with the the 33% above: there is a belief that the situation is intractable: the USA will never give Puerto Rico statehood, and Puerto Ricans will never demand Independence.
Now, I disagree with many of these views, but these are the views that to the best of our scientific ability, we can figure out Puerto Ricans having. Based on these realities, I believe the path of organizing for socialism and independence is a hard one, but not an impossible one: there are 11% who are undecided and 7% for independence. We have clear hints of dissatisfaction from the other camps. It can be done. It just requires optimism of the will, and organizational commitment to a socialist peace.
Jose M. Lopez Sierra said
Dear Friend,
The United Nations’ (UN) Decolonization Committee is in its third decade of trying to eradicate colonialism in the world. In that effort, it holds a hearing every year around June (the month New York City holds its Puerto Rican Day Parade) to discuss Puerto Rico’s colonial situation.
It would be very helpful if in next year’s hearing there could be a full house present with people interested in the decolonization of Puerto Rico. This hearing is not well publicized since some people would like to maintain the status quo forever.
Could you spread the word so that those interested in attending the June 2012 hearing could do so? The exact date has not yet been determined by the UN.
Thank you for your time in this matter!
Sincerely,
José M. López Sierra
United Partners for the Decolonization of Puerto Rico 2012
http://todosunidosdescolonizarpr.blogspot.com/?v=0
Renoa said
SKS:
The U.S. will never accept Puerto Rico as a Narco-Democracy like Colombia because its politics, economy and geographic range does not match Colombias, so the sheer scale would not work.
Furthermore, I beg to differ about independence, I believe now is a better time than any especially because Puerto Ricans have infiltrated every level of American society, and in particular the legal level, so why not reverse and revoke the unfair trial imposed on Pedro Albizu Campos?
Additionally, of course Puerto Rican’s cannot actually reveal their opinion about Puerto Rican Independence because I am certain that those Blacklists are still around and people fear for their lives.
Perhap the U.S. has really demonstrated intentional negligence towards Cuba, which has drive Puerto Rican fear, but you know what. They have their independence. To this day I am ashamed to see Yankee stars and stripes on my ‘flag.’ How about you? I’d rather not see my flag hanging up at the UN if it meant that I have to bow to Yankees who can never pronounce my name correctly, or speak a lick of my lingo.
SKS said
I am confused by this comment. I believe now is the time to struggle for Independence and socialism. I think you misread my points.
Wil said
It is unbilivable that people can talk about other contries as if they knew what they were talking about. There are allot of puertoricans that do not want independance for Puerto Rico. If you do not live in the US, how do you know what US is like? I can tell you this… I have travel more than half way around the world and in my days of living, I have not seen a better contry to live in than the USA. I was born and raised in Puerto Rico. I do like Puerto Rico. I went back to Puerto Rico three times been bilingual, having a good education, and even then,, I was not given a oportunity of a good job. I ask you, Why we go to the US??? We go to get a better oportunity for your self and your family, Education or not in Puerto Rico it is all about connections (who you know and who will help you! ) since you cannot find it in your own country. I have a Puertorican flag in my car and in my house, and no one has ever told me to take it down>>>> How many people come to the US looking for the American dream??? Allot!!! God bless you and me!!!
Carmelo Correa said
I am born Puerto Rican and Puerto Rican I will allways be. But, I Will allways will be a American too. God Bless all Puerto Ricans and our culture forever. We have a love for each other and mankind no other culture has.
Luis said
98% want permanent union with the US with Perpetual US citizenship.
79% want the US Presidential Vote
38-45% favor Statehood (they know statehood brings Federal taxes & responsibilities/Congressmen & Senators with the Prez vote.)
2-6% favor complete Independence(they believe the island will be self sustaining after the massive 2 million exodus of statehooders and commomwealthers to the mainland to escape independence.)
45% suppport “Estado libre Associado Soberano” That’s what the PPD party calls it! Its deceiving! (The PPD currently is infiltrated by independentistas at all leadership positions. The ELA soberano is really FREE ASSOCIATION. Free association is a compact between 2 SEPERATE nations! That’s right the leaders of the PPD, such as Cox Alomar,Carmen Yulin are also PIP independence party members! They seek to trick the electorate into voting for soveregn Commonwealth under the false premise that its the current Commonwealth in the US with “more Powers”/with soveregnty in the US. (That’s only possible under Statehood)
That’s why the PPD has always opposed english instruction in PR. If Puerto Ricans could read themselves what Soveregn Commonwealth is,that its a pact between 2 independent nations, they’d vote solidly for statehood.
Instead, like blind lemmings the PPD electorate will ignore the warnings of the statehood party, vote “yes” and soveregn ELA!
When the American media reports the results, they will say that independence of one kind or another won!!
45% free association/soveregn Commonwealth
+6 independence=51% independence or separation outside us territorry!
Prepare for an exodus of 2 million Ricans coming to the states to keep their citizenship. Just like the Cubans in the 60s, this massive Puerto rican wave will be mainly white ish and The white PR upper families fleeing possible communist regime that will replace the US government in PR.
jp said
getting senators and reps and a presidential vote only means those voters can say yes to more of the same.
if pr seeks a road ahead without being tied, like a tin can, to the military convoy that is the usa government, they might look to a free, associated affiliation with other caribbean and south american nations.