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Aspects in Church–State Relations in Puerto Rico, 1898–1900

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

Edward J. Berbusse S. J.
Edward J. Berbusse S. J.*
Affiliation:
Colegio San Ignacio, Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico
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Extract

In 1898 the United States fought Spain, terminating her colonial empire in the Americas and in the Pacific. With this conquest came problems for the United States in Cuba, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico. From October 18, 1898, to May 1, 1900, United States military governments controlled the island of Puerto Rico; and on April 12, 1900 the President of the United States approved the organic act (Foraker Act) which Congress had passed as the first civil government for Puerto Rico. The study of Church-state relations in this period is an interesting one, since it represents the conflict of two widely different conćepts: a residue of Spanish patronage which fostered the Church and its schools while confining the activity of the Church because of paternalism, anti-clericalism and a trend toward the philosophy of positivism; and Yankee-Americanism that was dominantly Protestant and wedded to the proposition that the Church must be separated from the state. It was a rugged wrenching that brought the Puerto Rican Church from a position of dependency to that of autonomy and self-support. The Church, moreover, had to engage in a political and legal fight for the retention of such properties as schools, churches, and cemeteries. Into the fray came such interested competitors as a United States Commission sent by President McKinley to report on the conditions in Puerto Rico, a small but vocal group of anti-clerical Puerto Ricans, three military governments, and the first civil governors.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , January 1963 , pp. 291 - 304
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1963

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References

1 Perea, Juan Agosto and Perea, Salvador, Early Ecclesiastical History of Puerto Rico (Caracas, 1929), pp. 20–21.Google Scholar

2 Mendoza, Antonio Cuesta, Historia eclesiastica del Puerto Rico colonial (Republica Dominicana, 1948), 1, 290–320.Google Scholar

3 Testimonies to the low level of religious practice are found in the Boletin eclesiastico [hereafter referred to as Bol. ecl] (San Juan, 1861–1899), October 15, 1860; March 15, 1875; March 1 and September 1, 1879; February 15, 1888; December 1, 1895; May 1, 1897. Vital statistics on non-sacramental marriages and births from consensual unions can be found in Bol. ecl., July 1, 1867; May 15, 1869; June 1, 1870; July 1, 1871. See also document number 965–152 of the Bureau of Insular Affairs (Interior Department), National Archives, Washington, D. C. [hereafter referred to as NA-BIA]. Statistics on the number of priests are found in Bol. ecl., January 1, 1870; January 1, 1881; January 20, 1899. Statistics on illiteracy are found in census reports (NA-BIA, 965–152). Though Catholicism was weak, the masses often displayed a basic religious enthusiasm. Cf. Bol. ecl., September 1, 1879.

4 Bol. ecl., September 8, 1898.

5 Ibid., January 20, 1899.

6 Archbishop Chapelle arrived in Puerto Rico on January 16, 1899, and left on February 9, 1899. Cf. Bol. ecl., January 20, February 28, 1899. The Treaty of Paris was concluded December 10, 1898; ratifications were exchanged and the treaty proclaimed April 11, 1899. U. S. Statutes, XXX, 1754.

7 Bol. ecl., September 30, 1899. Bishop James H. Blenk was born of Protestant parents in Neustadt, Bavaria. He became a Catholic in New Orleans. He was bishop of Puerto Rico from 1899 to 1906.

8 Letter of Archbishop Chapelle and Bishop Blenk to Secretary of War Root. No date of mailing given; date of receipt, September 8, 1899. NA-BIA, 613-12.

9 Ibid. With the cessation of royal patronage, the clergy was forced to rely upon what are called “stole fees,” i. e., offerings made for the administration of the sacraments of matrimony, baptism, and the rite of burial. The Escolapian Fathers were a Spanish religious foundation of San José de Calasanz, dedicated to the education of youth.

10 Chapelle and Blenk to Root. NA-BIA, 613-12.

11 Horatio S. Rubens to Robert H. Todd, July 29, 1930, explains that he retired from the position of counsel to the Insular Commission in 1898 because “I was not in accord with many of their opinions and suggested recommendations.” Todd was a friend of Rubens and had accompanied the commission to different parts of the island to serve as interpreter. NA-BIA, 21333-2; also BIA, “P” (personnel file), Robert H. Todd.

12 Bishop Blenk to Governor Davis, San Juan, February 6, 1900. NA-BIA, 834-16. I have been unable to find further papers on this matter. Dr. Henry K. Carroll, personal representative of President McKinley and author of the Carroll Report on Puerto Rico (1899), has a series of interesting articles on these matters. Cf. The Independent, March 2 and November 2, 1800; The Missionary Review of the World (Protestant Missionary Journal), August, 1900.

13 Brau, Salvador, Ecos de la batalla (Puerto Rico, 1896).Google Scholar Also, La democracia, April 1, 1899.

14 SJN, March 14, 1900.

15 San Juan, May 12, 1899. NA-BIA, 295-14.

16 Archbishop Chapelle to Major General Guy V. Henry, February 9, 1899. NA-BIA, 580–7.

17 Chapelle and Blenk to Root, September 8, 1899. NA-BIA, 613-12. Bol. ecl., September 30, 1899. The article was signed by the vicar capitular, Juan Perpiña y Pibernat.

18 General Davis: Hearings, Senate Committee on Puerto Rico. Senate Document 147, Fifty-sixth Congress, First Session. NA-BIA, 834–12.

19 Secretary Root to Bishop Blenk, October 17, 1899. Chapelle to Root, October 30, 1899. NA-BIA, 580-8, 580-2.

20 Senate Bill S. 7056, Fifty-seventh Congress, Second Session, January 21, 1903. NA-BIA, 580-9.

21 Roosevelt to Foraker, February 19, 1903. Foraker Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D. C.

22 Bishop Blenk to President Roosevelt, December 2, 1903. Root Papers, Box 207, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. Mr. William H. Hunt was the second civil governor of Puerto Rico. He had been the president of the executive council of Puerto Rico during the governorship of Charles H. Allen. In this same letter the bishop also criticized the economic condition of Puerto Rico: “The misery and grinding, killing poverty prevalent throughout the island are simply appalling. All that is being said about the prosperity of Porto Rico is a damnable lie. The pity of it; that this little island should be so unfortunate and wretched under our sway.”

23 Puerto Rico Herald, July 18, 1903. Luis Muñoz Rivera was a prominent political leader at the end of the nineteenth century and father of the present governor of Puerto Rico, Luis Muñoz Marin.

24 Brief of Juan Hernandez Lopez, Department of Interior, Rico, Puerto, Obras Publicas, February 24, 1906, Leg. 153.Google Scholar The excerpt is from the Civil Report of Brig. Gen. Leonard Wood, military governor of Cuba, January 1 to December 31, 1901.

25 Plaintiff’s brief prepared by Juan Hernandez Lopez, in Supreme Court of Rico, Porto, The Roman Catholic Apostolic Church in Porto Rico vs. The People of Porto Rico. Case No. 1, San Juan, 1906. Boletin mercantil, pp. 18–43.Google Scholar

26 Ibid., pp. 66–81.

27 Decision of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico, December 15, 1906. NA-BIA, 580-33. This case was appealed to the United States Supreme Court and in 1909 the Insular Court’s decision was upheld. Another case had been presented, in the name of the bishop of San Juan, by Hernandez Lopez, which concerned a building that had been erected by the Provincial Assembly (Diputación Provincial) at Stop 19 in Santurce in 1884. It was used by the Jesuits as a church and school until 1886 when the school was discontinued. The Chief Justice dismissed the case on the grounds that the Provincial Assembly had not given “a perpetual servitude of use”; but had given “with the reservation of rights in said resolutions.”

28 Bol. ecl, December 15, 1898.

29 Bol. ecl., January 20, 1899. This official Catholic publication cited the Gaceta oficial de Puerto Rico which on January 9, 1899, carried the official order of General Henry.

30 Major General Guy V. Henry: General Orders No. 13, February 7, 1899. NA-BIA, 1604.

31 Guy V. Henry (Capron Springs, West Virginia) to Major Pershing, July 5, 1899. NA-BIA, 613-11. Another facet of General Henry’s religious personality is found in a letter addressed to President McKinley on August 29, 1898. He wrote in part:

We have a work of morality, besides others. This is a good time to establish Churches. The People have no respect for the Priests … emissaries of Spain … and they would take to other beliefs … and worship. … Schools they ask for … and are anxious to learn … and now is the time for these people to come. … They want to become Americans in every way.

Cf. McKinley Papers, 1898, Vol. XVII, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.