other purpose. Since the recall of General Davis, on December 15, 1900, the district of Porto Rico has been commanded by Lieut. Col. James A. Buchanan, of the Porto Rico regiment, United States Volunteer Infantry. There are at present serving in the island 14 companies of soldiers-the 8 companies of the native regiment, 4 companies of the Eleventh Infantry, and 2 batteries of the Fifth Artillery. The necessary staff officers are also on duty here. These troops are distributed over the country in the principal cities, San Juan, Ponce, and Mayaguez, and at Cayey, a beautiful mountain town, where they have comfortable barracks. The most cordial and pleasant relations have, from the first, existed and still continue between the military and the civil authorities.

CONCLUSION.

The duties of the governor of Porto Rico are set forth in the organic act as follows:

That the official title of the chief executive officer shall be "the governor of Porto Rico." He shall be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate; he shall hold his office for a term of four years and until his successor is chosen and qualified unless sooner removed by the President; he shall reside in Porto Rico during his official incumbency, and shall maintain his office at the seat of government; he may grant pardons and reprieves, and remit fines and forfeitures for offenses against the laws of Porto Rico, and respites for offenses against the laws of the United States, until the decision of the President can be ascertained; he shall commission all officers that he may be authorized to appoint, and may veto any legislation enacted, as hereinafter provided; he shall be the commander in chief of the militia, and shall at all times faithfully execute the laws, and he shall in that behalf have all the powers of governors of the Territories of the United States that are not locally inapplicable; and he shall annually, and at such other times as he may be required, make official report of the transactions of the government in Porto Rico, through the Secretary of State, to the President of the United States: Provided, That the President may, in his discretion, delegate and assign to him such executive duties and functions as may in pursuance with law be so delegated and assigned.

It has been the honest endeavor of the present incumbent to follow the law in the discharge of his official duties. He has resided in Porto Rico and maintained his office in the city of San Juan, the seat of government, commonly spoken of by the inhabitants as "La Capital." Here he has been always accessible to the people of the island, and every one desiring to confer with him on matters of public importance has at all times had full and free opportunity of doing so. Many of the best citizens have favored him with their advice, and some have become offended because their counsel was disregarded, and sought relief in intemperate criticism through the printed periodicals. However, the executive has endeavored to pursue the even tenor of his way, and, after patiently hearing all advice offered, to act on his own best judgment, aided by study and reflection.

The pardoning of convicts and the granting of reprieves and remis

sions of fines has been found to be one of the most delicate and difficult duties imposed upon the governor by the act of Congress. However, it has been met, it is hoped, in a proper spirit, and an earnest effort has been exerted to temper justice with mercy. So many pardons had been necessarily granted by the military governors, owing to the peculiar circumstances which they found existing on the island at the conquest, that every prisoner after he had carried his case through every court in Porto Rico, as he can do without cost or bond, would as a last resort appeal to executive clemency. A rule had to be established requiring all such applications to come through the attorneygeneral's office, and have his indorsement, favorable or unfavorable, before they could receive executive attention. By this means what would otherwise have been an enormous and interminable labor was somewhat lightened. As it is, however, the chief magistrate of Porto Rico has passed on hundreds of applications for clemency. Ninety-two pardons have been granted, but no reprieves; and eight remissions of fines and forfeitures. No applications have been made for any respite for any offenses against the laws of the United States, pending the decision of the President. However, three pardons have been granted by the President to prisoners sentenced under convictions in the United States courts.

During the year commissions have been issued to 42 officers who held their positions under the insular government. Many officers after receiving appointments resigned them for trivial causes or at the dictates of party leaders, so such vacancies had to be filled by new appointments. However, it may be stated here as well as elsewhere that the action of such obstructionists has not embarrassed the admin istration in the least, as no difficulty has been found in filling each vacancy with a better man than the prior incumbent.

In commanding the militia and the execution of the laws the chief executive has had the hearty cooperation of each and every one of his constitutional advisers and subordinates, and to their efforts and abilities in a great measure is due whatever success his administration has attained during the first year of its existence which has just closed.

FUTURE.

Respecting the future of the island, the first question will naturally refer to the development of its form of government. The general scheme of colonial administration is presented in an object lesson, in the immediate neighborhood, in the excellent systems represented in the Danish, French, and English West Indies-a system which stands to-day as the best development of more than two hundred years of the trained application of experienced experts, and which, in the nature of things, will be accepted as probably the best working out of the question under all conditions. Under such a system it must be truthfully

admitted the rights of the people in whose interest such legislation has been directed have been carefully guarded. By such forms, that protection to property and security to person have been preserved, without which all government is a failure.

So that, taking these islands as an example, we might safely follow along such general lines. But if it be the policy of the General Government to extend to this island, as undoubtedly is intended, a measure of government broader, more liberal, and more in accord with our system of territorial government, then certain changes from accepted colonial administration must be inaugurated.

Many people have felt that the form of territorial government adopted in the United States should be followed here; that if we are to have Territories then there should be but one general form, and not one. form for the United States and Hawaii and another for Porto Rico. And if it is urged that such a standard form of territorial government may be useful in the United States, where all its conditions are well understood by the people generally, while the same form if applied to an island far out in the ocean would totally fail, then the form recently adopted by Congress for Hawaii is put forward as a sufficient answer. But it must be remembered that while Hawaii represents perhaps similar relations to the Pacific coast that Porto Rico geographically does to the Atlantic, there is yet a wide difference between the two islands, which grows stronger as it is worked out more in detail. Hawaii represents an area with a comparatively small population, and has for many years had the advantage of colonization by Americans, with the familiarity with American institutions a long ancestry of acquaintance would bring with it. American capital has been largely invested there, and a territorial government there would be at once understood and immediately become easily adapted to the few economical and ethnological conditions to be encountered, very much as such a form of government would be adopted in a newly developed part of the United States, while, on the other hand, Porto Rico has been a comparatively unknown island to Americans; with a small part of its area under cultivation,, and an over-population in comparison with the cultivated area. Though a measurably short distance away from the continent, even at the beginning of the Spanish war, our navy vessels rarely entered any harbor in Porto Rico, though visiting all well-known ports. St. Thomas, less than 100 miles away from this island, was a free port of call to all nations and the general rendezvous of the West Indies.

American occupation, therefore, found the island inhabited by a race of people of different language, religion, customs, and habits, with no acquaintance practically with American methods, and with the commerce and trade in the hands of the Spaniards With a beautiful island, indeed, but with its natural resources practically 21400-01--7

undeveloped, and its population so trained during a period of some four hundred years as to be, as a people, unfitted to at once assume, without careful training and preparation, the management of their own affairs. The accepted form of territorial government would not, I fancy, serve the best purpose here, nor do I think it should be introduced here purely as administered in the United States until the people have been trained to a fuller appreciation of the duties and responsibilities of civil government. I feel, as the result of one year's close study, on the spot, of all the conditions surrounding the problem, that Congress went quite as far as it could safely venture in the form of government already existing in the island, and as the result of such experience and observation I fully believe, with good men devoted to the work, the island will develop faster under such form, its people through experience and education will advance more rapidly in their knowledge of civic virtues under a guidance of present methods than could be gained in any other way. And I therefore feel that a departure from the present general form, except such minor modifications as experience will show from time to time to be wise and necessary, would be a grave mistake, and likely to be attended with considerable annoyance and anxiety. And I go a step further to say that intelligent Americans, fully acquainted with the situation, without regard to political affiliation, if interrogated, would stand as one man on the proposition that Congress had gone as far in the present form of government as it possibly could until experience and training have produced their results in a fuller knowledge of the duties and responsibilities of civil government on the part of the inhabitants.

As to the future of the people. In seeking to impart information on unfamiliar subjects we should speak plainly. Experience has shown that under past conditions but little real progress has been made here, judged by comparison, by the people themselves. While the more educated and cultured possess qualities of great usefulness, there has been so little future for the masses that they have never realized what opportunities for development their native land possessed. Part of this is due, no doubt, to climatic conditions. Nature has done so much for these people and has required so little in return that the problem. of life has been free from those terrible anxieties which possess the soul of the toilers of other climes and by their very inexorable demands develop those qualities of thrift, industry, and perseverance which underlie individual as well as national prosperity. In a climate where the temperature ranges between 70 and 85 degrees day and night, week in and week out, where little clothing is required and shelter means protection from the tropical sun rather than climatic changes; where a man can lie in a hammock, pick a banana with one hand, and dig a sweet potato with one foot, the incentive to idleness is easy to yield to and brings its inevitable consequences.