THE PRESIDENT OF THE PARTIDO NACIONALISTA COMMENTS ON THE TAKING OF POSSESSION OF THE GOVERNOR ROBERT H. GORE “The monarchical absolutism of the eighteenth century also had itself consecrated, by force. With the doctrine of the divine right of kings, it imposed the invocation of divinity so that tyranny would be clothed in sanction. A gross blasphemy was perpetrated. Despotism has no sanction, and it is ridiculed when it invokes it. It is only respectable when it speaks through the mouth of its cannons. As foreign despotism has no justification whatsoever, it has never invoked divine power to impose itself. The North American empire that has profaned everything in its advance through extermination, had to be the exception. We have just witnessed the inauguration of the new chief of the yanki intervention. The outgoing governor, Presbyterian and Mason and affiliated with the yanki Republican party hands over the imposed power, to the new imperial leader, Catholic and Knight of Columbus, and member of the North American Demócrata party. Two bishops, one Catholic and one Protestant, bless the ceremony and formulate the divine invocation. The actors are, of course, all yankis, who, despite their antagonistic political and religious convictions, reveal an impressive unity of purpose to maintain the North American empire in Puerto Rico, even if to do so it is necessary to appeal to God through all imaginable religious avenues. It is good to remember that the new chief of the intervention, despite being Catholic and a Knight of Columbus is the representative of the North American dictator, Roosevelt, who is Protestant and Mason. The empire manifests itself united before us. It breaks, deliberately, the routine of appointing Protestant and Masonic representatives, and opts for a Catholic Knight of Columbus, attentive exclusively to its policy of absorption. The unwary could not suspect that the government of the United States would appeal, for the exercise of its devastating imperialism, to the cooperation of North American Catholicism. It is known that that empire is governed by a Masonic and Protestant oligarchy that postpones as much as it can, its Catholic and Jewish fellow citizens. It is yanki constitutional dogma -so natural that there has been no need to consign it in writing- that no Catholic can occupy the presidency of the empire. An illegitimate power makes use of all means to impose itself, and, does not hesitate to use its own enemies for its ends. When its victims lend themselves to being voluntary collaborators, an identification of purpose is manifested against who is supposed to be the common enemy. The yankis, Catholics or Protestants, Masons or Knights of Columbus, with what happened in the taking of possession of the command of the North American forces, have revealed that unity of imperialist ends against the Puerto Rican nation. The response to that united enemy front, is the united front of the Homeland. A certain routine of imperial policy is broken only in the presence of necessity. The empire always makes use of suitable representatives who can strengthen it in the intervened nations. The militant Nationalism of Filipinas and Puerto Rico has imposed this shift in the selection of the chiefs of the intervention in both intervened nations. It is about weakening the invocation of the traditionalist forces with invading influences that may mystify the Puerto Ricans. In lending itself to that maneuver of yanki imperialism, the North American clergy residing in Puerto Rico, is violating mandatory provisions of the Church. The North American Catholic priest who serves as an instrument to yanki imperialism in Puerto Rico is not worthy of the ecclesiastical investiture. As that serious evil can ruin the superior interests of the Church, it is foreseen and addressed with provisions that oblige the natural clergy of the intervening country to sacrifice themselves, if it were necessary, in defense of the rights of the intervened nation. It is the only way to prevent the priesthood from ending in sacrilege. We are facing a clear and dangerous fact for the Homeland. The North American clergy, Catholic and Protestant, is only an instrument of the imperialism of its country. We have to fight it on all fronts. Its cooperation with the yanki empire has reached the extreme, of voluntarily offering and in solemn public act when assuming the command of the intervention a new representative, the concurrence of its moral force. The imperialist attitude of the yanki Protestant clergy is known by all so that it requires more comments. Now, that the new governor is Catholic, it is necessary to clarify the imperialist tendencies of a part of the North American Catholic clergy. Here a Catholic religious community has been established, which is called Redentorista. With centers in Mayagüez, Guayama, Caguas, Puerta de Tierra. In their schools that follow the same official system, -teaching in English, knowledge of yanki things and ignorance of the rest of the world, the greatest attraction towards everything North American is maintained, with constant display of the North American flag in their classrooms. They hoist it over the towers of the church itself, in full defiance of public opinion. The friars follow practices alien to those ordered by the Latin Council to which Puerto Rico belongs. Their attitude, far from being a manifestation of Christian meekness, is of haughtiness with an air of ridiculous superiority. As they have been faithful collaborators of the regime, in their houses the yanki governors were always splendidly entertained, although they were all Protestants and Masons, 270 revealing that unity of imperialist purpose against the Puerto Ricans. This desire for command and to possess material things that was already organized for the pontificate of His Holiness, León XIII, gave rise to the formation of the heresy called Americanism, which deserved to be condemned by this wise pontiff. That attitude is alive and has begun to act aggressively in our country. We notify you that it will not be tolerated. To the inaugural words of the new chief of the intervention, who has received such religious investiture, we will make a brief gloss. The yanki empire fights to displace us in our own country. It has appealed to neo-Malthusianism, to emigration, to diseases, to everything that promotes our extinction. It has already been said: “the yankis are interested in the cage but not the birds.” From the armchair of the palace of Santa Catalina, in whose shadow the Puerto Rican Nation arose, consecrated to the ideals of pure Christianity, a people of fine sentiment has contemplated a yanki leader advocating publicly demoralizing practices such as neo-Malthusianism. It is to congratulate mister Gore for having rectified his immediate successor in the post. The new governor assumes a citizen community between the Puerto Ricans and the North Americans. He is deeply mistaken. From one end of the country to the other, there exists inextinguishable hatred against the North American military occupation. Grave is his error in believing that Puerto Rico has been the object of North American largesse. He must study the statistics of our commerce and he will find that the nation has always had a favorable commercial balance for thirty-five consecutive years, including the last four, characterized by the deepest crisis. That favorable balance amounts to a sum that exceeds one thousand two hundred million dollars, enough for Puerto Rico to be today a financial power of the first order. But yanki capitalism, protected by its government, has taken that enormous profit and instead of our country being an emporium of wealth, it has sixty percent of its population unemployed and the entire country mortgaged to yanki banks. Mister Gore says well that there is a need for emigration. What we do not agree on is the selection of people. All foreigners must leave Puerto Rico immediately, starting with the yanki colony that exceeds two thousand parasitic individuals, representatives of the yanki interests that control ninety percent of our wealth. Puerto Ricans have rights in their Homeland that they will make respected and no one plans to emigrate, and much less to a place like Florida, governed by laws that deny the electoral vote to any person of color; laws that declare null any marriage between people of different races, that convert into a public crime punishable by imprisonment that conjugal union and condemn to illegitimacy the children born therein, laws that impose the forced separation of races in theaters, churches, places of amusement, transportation vehicles, etc.; laws crowned by the most humane of the laws of barbarism, the law of lynching. A grave illusion has taken possession of Mister Gore. He believes he has true powers that he can exercise with responsibility before his own conscience. It is necessary that he observe that he must abide at all times by the instructions he receives from that den of conspiracy against Puerto Rico, which they call the Negociado de Asuntos Insulares. As a matter of conscience, we must remind him that in conscience he cannot exercise foreign despotism. He speaks again of a dead theme among us, such as annexationism to convert Puerto Rico into a yanki province (“state” sic), Everyone already knows that annexation is reprehensible in any form, and especially today, when the United States is governed by the personal dictatorship of Roosevelt, a dictatorship that everyone expects to become a firm political institution. Mister Gore should not feel overwhelmed by duties of his or of his Homeland towards the Puerto Ricans. He can be calm in that regard. The United States of North America has a single duty to fulfill with Puerto Rico, and, it is to immediately withdraw its armed forces from our territory. We know that that does not depend on Mister Gore. Nor are the yankis our doctors -we already know what North American doctors come for- nor are we the Puerto Ricans sick to be cured by such doctors. Puerto Rico is a nation of superior civilization and culture and does not need mentors mired in barbarism such as that prevailing in more than half of the United States of the type existing in Florida to which the Puerto Ricans must go again, -reminiscing the immortal Ponce de León-, to reintegrate it into Christian civilization. P. ALRIZU CAMPOS
Nationalist Party President Comments on Governor Robert H. Gore's Inauguration
Date:
1 de January de 1933
Source:
Pedro Albizu Campos, Obras Escogidas 1923-1936, Tomo I (San Juan: Editorial Jelofe, 1975)
Country:
Puerto Rico