Porto Rico Under Colonial Government
The Senate Porto Rico tariff and civil government bill passed the House of Representatives in Congress, Wednesday, April 11, by a vote of one hundred and sixty-one to one hundred and fifty-three, and was signed by the President, and so became the law of Porto Rico, Thursday, April 12. It definitely establishes a colonial system of government by the United States, without the Constitution, with a governor and council appointed by the President, approved by the Senate, the governor the personal representative of the President, and responsible only to the President. It is in principle, and will prove in practice, Republican Rome’s system of colonial government, which was a mighty element in hurrying that republic into the terrific imperial despotism that it became. The present assistant secretary of the navy, Hon. Chas. H. Allen, of Massachusetts, has been chosen by the President as the first United States colonial governor of Porto Rico. The Washington correspondent of the Detroit News-Tribune says that “Mr. Allen is credited by those familiar with his two-years’ service in the Navy Department, with being a man of unusual poise and ability, and with unswerving loyalty to his President and party.” Of course in Porto Rico he can not be loyal to the Constitution; because there he is to govern without the Constitution. Since he is the personal representative of the President, he can be loyal only to the President. That is, in that place and office he can not be loyal to principle, but only to a person.