The Nationalist Party shall develop the following economic program: 1 It will organize the workers so that they may recover from foreign or invading interests the participation in the profits to which they are entitled, assuming their immediate direction, placing men of stature, responsibility, and patriotism to direct them. 2 It will endeavor by all means to ensure that the fiscal burden falls on non-residents, to destroy latifundismo and absenteeism, and to divide real estate property among the largest possible number of landowners. 3 It must by all means at its disposal reserve the effect of free cabotage between Estados Unidos and Puerto Rico, which today exclusively benefits the invader. 4 It will exclusively favor native commerce where it exists and will promote it where it has disappeared. 5 It will exclusively favor the consumption of the fruits of the land and of Puerto Rican industry, endeavoring by all means to satisfy the needs of the Homeland. 6 It will promote the exportation and the establishment of the maritime transportation industry. 7 It will exclusively favor native banks and where there are none, it will endeavor to organize them. 8 It will endeavor to organize finances in such a form of native banking respectability that national deposits are made only in their banks, and, it will endeavor to free the country from foreign public or private loans, so that agriculture, commerce, and industry in Puerto Rican hands can resurge powerfully. The election for President of the Party was carried out by secret ballot, with Lcdo. Pedro Albizu Campos being elected. The public stood and gave him an ovation upon learning the result of the count. The other elected officials were: First Vice-President, Cándido Martínez; Second Vice-President, M. Fernández Mascaró; Treasurer, Abelardo Ruiz Morales; Secretary, Manuel Rivera Matos.
The National Board of the Party was formed by two appointments from each judicial district in accordance with the regulations. For San Juan: Rafael Rojas Lozano and Ramón H. Vicente; for Ponce: Eduardo G. Ramú and Juan Augusto Perea; for Arecibo: Fernando Sierra Berdecía and José G. Gardé; for Humacao: Lcdo. Pedro Pérez Pimentel and José P. Berríos; for Aguadilla: José M. Gil Cabassa and Severino Lecároz; for Mayaguez: Dr. M. Guzmán Rodríguez and Modesto Gotay. The interim President, Mr. Miguel Marcos Morales, vacated the presidency for Lcdo. Albizu Campos to occupy it.
INAUGURAL SPEECH OF ALBIZU CAMPOS
Lcdo. Albizu Campos, upon occupying the Presidency, addressed the assembly in the following terms: “We are going to carry out an intense work of purified nationalism with a defined orientation and program of action. Our Party will not enter into compromises with the other parties nor will we at any time tolerate immediate transactions that undermine the purity of the ideal. This Board will have no prejudices against any nationalist as long as that nationalist fulfills the duties imposed on him by his party.
“This Board will do everything in its power to carry out an effective and combative work. It is impossible, companions, that this shameful colonialism continue without acting in a decisive manner. We cannot tolerate the prevailing situation in the country for even one more minute. There is no need to fear this Board in any sense. We will be implacable, of course, with those who want to mutilate the integrity or the purity of our party. We will carry out an intense ideological campaign to demonstrate to the country the fallacies contained in the political programs of the other parties.
“I am going to demand a promise from the patriots of blood and bone, of valor and spirit who have remained in this assembly until these late hours of the night. An optimistic philosophy must inform all our actions. A pessimistic doctrine rains upon our people that demoralizes and intimidates them, and that we must stop at all times. It is necessary to raise the public spirit of Puerto Rico and tell it that it can become what it wants and conquer its independence if its will so desires. We are in full civic bankruptcy and it is necessary that we bring a moral infusion to our people so that they may believe again in their destiny and in their possibilities. Our Homeland is in full war without defending itself; only a resurgence of collective morality can save it.
I have never believed in numbers. We have to bring here the brothers consecrated to the nationalist ideal. We have to tell our Homeland the truth and the enormous misfortune that weighs on its life. I am going to invoke the name of our great patricians who died for the liberty of this land so that they may illuminate us in our mission.
“Now companions, I am going to demand an oath of honor from you. (The audience stood and raised their hands). Let us swear here solemnly that we will defend the nationalist ideal and that we will sacrifice our estate and our life if necessary for the independence of our Homeland.” (Applause).
Pedro Albizu Campos addresses the delegates to the General Assembly of the Nationalist Party held in the halls of the Ateneo Puertorriqueño on May 11, 1930. This assembly elected him president of the collectivity. Among others, José Coll Cuchí, Antonio Ayuso Valdivieso, Manuel Guzmán Rodríguez, Antonio R. Barceló, Luis Lloréns Torres, José S. Alegría, Vicente Géigel Polanco and Samuel R. Quiñones appear.
WHAT THE PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONALIST PARTY ANSWERS TO THE MANIFESTATIONS OF DON JOSE COLL CUCHI
Mr. José Coll Cuchí has definitively withdrawn from the Nationalist Party. He declared it flatly before the Assembly that the Party has just celebrated. He disdained the commission that went to look for him to rectify what was said. He refused in absolute terms. I can assure Mr. José Coll Cuchí, that the Nationalist Party has definitively emerged from an enormous nightmare. In response to his insult to the Nationalist Assembly that applauded what I said before it, I will limit myself to rejecting his declarations, all false, affirming that Cuba, Santo Domingo, foreigners, especially Spaniards, and other entities were offended there. I have maintained here and everywhere, and not for any convenience, the following postulates: The independence of Puerto Rico; The Antillean confederation; The Ibero-American Union; The world hegemony of the Ibero-American nations. The prestige of each of these nations has been and is sacred to me. He accuses me of having attacked Estados Unidos for the policy that the invader has imposed on our land. I do not defend myself from that, nor will I ever defend myself. It honors me. I grant Mr. José Coll Cuchí the privilege of continuing to sing to the flag of Estados Unidos as he did in my presence at the first nationalist rally that we celebrated in the Plaza Baldorioty in the year 1924, something that forced me to correct him on the same platform and in his presence. That same praise to the flag of Estados Unidos was repeated in the Assembly of the Alianza held in Mayaguez in the past year. Such is the information that I deserve all credit and that I have received from respectable gentlemen attending said act. We venerate the glorious name of José Martí, all the defenders of liberty. That is why I called him in the speech I gave at the Assembly, the Apostle, the Teacher, and the Martyr of libertarian ideals. I do not know if Mr. José Coll Cuchí is known in Cuba
they are informed of my work pro-Cuba. However, we are lucky that he and I are known in the República Dominicana. I leave to the opinion of Quisqueya the judgment that should be made of his thoughtless remarks, pregnant with anger at having been snatched away the instrument to impose himself on the Nationalist Party. The entire Press was represented in the great purifying act that authentic nationalism has just celebrated. I perfectly remember the presence of the representatives of all our newspapers and of the “Prensa Asociada.”
The information given by the Press until now condemns all the insidious assertions of José Coll Cuchí. Justice must be done and for this it is necessary to tell the truth, no matter who it hurts.
It is not true that Mr. Ayuso or Mr. Coll Cuchi were the organizers of the Assembly. The truth is that they opposed its organization by all possible means, until the last hour, that they intended to embark on the triumphant car already in motion, evidently to manage it at their whim. That intention was manifest before the Assembly before the unheard-of insistence of Mr. Ayuso to want to persist in the presidency of the Assembly when it desired a Provisional Board that deserved its trust,
It was necessary to force the Presidency of the National Board, Mr. Ayuso, to appoint a Commission to carry out the organization of the Assembly. It was presided over by Lcdo. Cándido Martínez, and after many setbacks, it had the resounding success that has surprised everyone. Insidiousness and insincerity are twins.
Since we are talking about concord for all, I ask Mr. José Coll Cuchí, who was the one who had the audacity to alter at his whim the invitation that the National Board approved to be communicated to all Political Parties?
Why did Mr. Ayuso and Mr. José Coll Cuchí oppose the invitation to the Assembly, to the Partido Unión de Puerto Rico? Why did these gentlemen intend to invite exclusively the Alianza Puertorriqueña? Why did they mutilate the text of the invitation to all the parties, with the purpose of attacking the Partido Unionista? Daring that did us great harm.
And finally, why did Mr. José Coll Cuchí not wait for the reply that his outpouring of bile deserved, and, instead of enduring what he should deserve in the presence of the entire Assembly, he ran down the stairs at the end of his speech, and refused to return to the Assembly when a Commission appointed by the presidency of the Assembly went to look for him at his house? There is no doubt, Mr. José Coll Cuchí. The temple is clean. The Puerto Rican Nation is pleased. You will not be able to continue harming it with your nefarious shadow to Puerto Rican Nationalism.
PEDRO ALBIZU CAMPOS
FEMINISM AND HOMELAND INDEPENDENCE²⁵
By Pedro Albizu Campos
Faced with a people anxious for their independence and willing to make the necessary sacrifices to obtain it, a group of leaders not willing to break with the prevailing regime of the colony had placed themselves.
When we say a people, of course, we refer to the Puerto Rican national unity, without distinctions of any kind, and much less the absurd distinction of dividing it between men and women.
The contemporary Puerto Rican woman has suffered, until now, from the abrogation of her representation by a group of ladies, who with the title of feminists, have always spoken in her name, and have fought for her to be granted the right to vote.
If the men who direct public opinion wasted much of their time fighting each other, instead of facing the invader, the feminists dedicated all their energies to the acquisition of suffrage, believing without a doubt, that by fighting the men who opposed this measure, they fulfilled the purpose of the existence of their organization.
They have obtained suffrage. We are obliged to ask them what they want it for. Is it perhaps to reinforce colonialism over their Homeland? Or to annex it to Estados Unidos definitively, annulling its international personality to turn it into a North American province (“Estado” sic.?) or is it to make Puerto Rico a Homeland, free, sovereign and independent?
We repeat the public interrogation that we formulated before the last Nationalist Assembly: Are women going to repeat the sin of men of dividing among themselves on the vital issue of the independence of their Homeland?
If feminist women are to present themselves to the country representing, not a solid libertarian movement, but the various existing political parties, fighting among themselves, and spreading before the public opinion of the country all the political errors committed by the leading men during the last thirty years, it is necessary to call their attention in the most energetic way to the historical responsibility that they acquire when exercising suffrage for the first time.
If you want to opine in politics, you have to assume the necessary responsibilities. The woman as director of political opinion, since she has placed herself in that field, has and must expect to be held responsible for what she says. It is not a patriotic ideal to preach the annexation of your country to any other country. Nor is it a patriotic ideal to defend the colonialism that weighs on the country.
The only transcendental civic duty that he who was born in a colony has, be it man or woman, is to redeem it from colonialism. Are the feminist ladies ready to fulfill this unavoidable duty?
It seems so. We have read with great interest the manifestations that Mrs. Angela Negrón Muñoz regularly publishes in the section called “Conversing with the main feminists of the country” in the Sunday edition of EL MUNDO.
With rare exceptions, the interviews published in said section with that epigraph, have greatly discouraged us. We have seen almost all the errors of political, social, economic and religious appreciation that have ruined a healthy orientation of our people repeated. Everything, almost everything, has been a accumulation of repetitions of old, worn-out and refuted things, ad nauseam.
The sad case is given that when the leadership headed by men in the different political parties begins to orient themselves towards patriotic and definitive purposes, it is from this feminist section that the most disorienting affirmations rain upon our people. We insist that the woman, like the man, has to be responsible for what she says.
Doña Angela confesses to being mortified by certain manifestations that we made before the last assembly of the party on the occasion of the emotional offer that the Club de Damas de Puerto Plata, República Dominicana, made to me, representing the Dominican woman, to defend the independence of Puerto Rico.
Hasn’t Doña Angela been moved by this offer? Haven’t the feminist ladies who she claims feel wounded by my statements before the Assembly been moved? Why, if they represent the highest values of our woman, have they not yet met to send a message of gratitude to the Club de Damas de Puerto Plata that so generously and spontaneously has offered its contest to free them from this shameful tutelage?
We owe a congratulation to Doña Angela. For the first time, since we read it, we have seen it invoke the name of immortal women of our Homeland who sacrificed everything for its independence.
We also owe it a rectification. We must not compare with figures anointed by the sacrifice for the redemption of this land to people who maintain as an ideal the annexation of their country to any other, or defend the empire in their Homeland, imposed by a foreign power. Madam, allow me to tell you that there are impossible parallels. That the one who writes has a historical responsibility and cannot confuse values.
Several times we have repeated that we have to go back to the year 1868. At the time of the Grito de Lares. There existed then an authentic and patriotic direction in our Homeland, of men and women
willing to make any sacrifice to impose their independence. We would appreciate it if you continue to present only those luminous libertarian figures to our people. If that was so in ‘68, as you well say, that more civism was needed than today to defend the cause of liberty, no doubt, you will estimate it justified, that today, according to you that it costs nothing to do the same, we urge men and women to fulfill the most important civic duty: Immediately constitute the free, sovereign and independent republic.
“THE NATIONALIST PARTY WILL ACCEPT ONLY THOSE POSITIONS THAT DEPEND ON THE SOVEREIGNTY OF OUR PEOPLE,” SAYS LCDO. ALBIZU CAMPOS²⁶ On the occasion of the letter from Mr. Luis García Casanova, President of the Local Board of the Nationalist Party in Caguas, published in our edition of the day before yesterday, in which he declines the position of Director of Public Works that was offered to him by Dr. José Reguero González, alleging that the policy of his Party prevents him from accepting anything that implies “contact with the usurping government of the rights of our people, such as the government of Estados Unidos de Norte América”, we interviewed Lcdo. Pedro Albizu Campos, President of the Nationalist Party and asked him the following questions: What should be the future attitude of the Nationalist Party in electoral matters, as such a political collectivity? Will it register candidates with the Executive Secretary? Mr. Albizu Campos made the following statements to us: “The attitude of the Nationalist Party is defined in the declaration that is formulated in the program adopted at the last assembly and that says so: “That the immediate suppression of North American colonialism is unavoidable and commits itself to celebrating the constituent convention that establishes in Puerto Rico the government of a free, sovereign, and independent republic, as soon as it receives the suffrage of the majorities.” ““To achieve that purpose, it will resort to the polls and will make use of all legal means at its disposal, including of course registration with the Executive Secretary or before any existing colonial body as provided by the Electoral Law then in force. “The Nationalist Party will accept only those positions that depend on the sovereignty of our people, that is, only elective positions, but will never solicit directly or indirectly positions in the administration of the colony that depend on the will of the President of Estados Unidos, or of his representative in Puerto Rico, the Governor of the colony.
“Nor of course will it enter into arrangements, understandings, alliances or pacts of any kind with any other political party based on division of the budget because that practice is corrupting of public morals. “Any understanding that the Nationalist Party could reach will have to be based on its program, which is clear and conclusive in demanding the immediate suppression of colonialism and the peremptory establishment of an independent republican government, responsible exclusively to the Puerto Rican nation. “Such is the sovereign will of the party in repudiating from the year 1924 until now the combinations that the existing parties have proposed to it. That will was definitively expressed when the last Sovereign Assembly adopted the program that today governs the actions of our collectivity. “The leadership of the Nationalist Party in Caguas is brilliant. It is perfectly oriented and is capable of all sacrifices for the achievement of the ideal of Homeland independence. “The letter from Don Luis García Casanova, member of the National Board, is not only a definition of our policy, but also a definition of public morals.”
COMMENTS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONALIST PARTY ALONGSIDE THE REPORT SUBMITTED BY THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTE²⁸
Christian civilization has imposed the norm of law in the internal life and in the external relations of nationalities. It is true that there has been violent temptation against that norm, but that it is respected, under penalty of falling back into barbarism, is undeniable. Even the war of dispossession requires justification. The masses of the aggressor must be mobilized with ideals of respect for rules of a higher order. One cannot appeal to their sense of sordidness or selfishness if one wants to create armed institutions capable of heroism that have the very sacrifice as their limit. When attacking the neighbor, it is necessary to give explanations to the world. The strange intervention in the contest is a danger that is always taken into account, because it is in the interest of all nations to maintain the balance that allows each one to develop within its full sovereignty. Although the sinister designs of Estados Unidos were always to take possession of the Antilles, to turn the Caribbean into a Yankee lake, and thus exert a strategic influence over Méjico, Centro and Sur América, it was not possible to make known to the North American nation the true purposes of conquest. They were told to wage a war for reasons of humanity. Before international opinion, the case of Cuba and Puerto Rico under Spanish sovereignty was presented as something so intolerable in the light of civilization that it forced a nation anxious not to disturb the peace to intervene so that our right to enjoy liberty would be respected. Thus, with North American patriotism exalted, the concerns of other powers lulled, and Antillean hopes unduly exalted, war was declared. The Yankee invasion of Puerto Rico in 1898 meant the disappearance of obscurantism and the oppression of the Spaniards, and the advent of a regime of liberty, equality, fraternity, and material prosperity, judging by Yankee propaganda. And all that happiness was imposed on us generously by North American philanthropy and the sense of humanity. The invaders imposed the Treaty of Paris on Spain. We were not consulted for its drafting or approval. They forced Spain to cede Puerto Rico as war indemnity.