File No. 837.00/1493

The Minister in Cuba ( Gonzales ) to the Secretary of State

No. 758

Sir: I have the honor to inform the Department that on the 14th instant, the constitutional guaranties, which had been suspended since the revolution of February 1917, were restored by presidential decree, and the accompanying proclamation (translation) to the press was published simultaneously with their restoration.

Months ago the President announced that he would restore the constitutional guaranties when, and only when, the laws he asked for, which would enable him to discharge his international obligations, were passed by Congress.

I have [etc.]

William E. Gonzales
[Enclosure—Translation]

President Menocal’s Proclamation of August 14, 1918

To the People of Cuba:

The voters of the country having on the 2d of August been convoked by the Central Electoral Board for the election to be held on the first of November next, the moment has arrived for the rival political forces to work with entire freedom and firm decision under the protection of the constitutional guaranties restored by my decree of this date with the single exception of the guaranty contained in Article 22 of the Constitution in respect of private correspondence, which must continue subject to censure, for the duration of the war, for obvious reasons of public safety.

Suspension of the guaranties had not, it must in justice be said, subsisted in detriment of the political rights of citizens, nor for any political purposes whatever affecting the internal life of the nation, after the seditious movement of February (1917) had been put down, but for the purpose of more effectively keeping down espionage and the machinations of agent or auxiliary subjects of enemy powers in the great struggle for right, liberty and international justice, in which Cuba has of her free will and with energetic resolution joined [Page 284] her destiny with those of the Allied Nations for the defense and victory of that noble cause and its high and supreme ideals.

It was not possible, therefore, to restore the constitutional guaranties in the absence of special laws for the detection of espionage and for the surveillance and repression of enemy aliens; for without such laws the Government would have been helpless in the face of unavoidable exigencies of the existing state of war, as compelling for our own safety as for the loyal fulfilment of our obligations to the Allied Nations.

Those laws have now been enacted and vest in me, if not all the exceptional means and all the extraordinary powers available, in this terrible world crisis, not only to the governments of belligerent nations but to those of nearly all the neutral nations, and especially of our great neighbor Republic, illustrious model of liberty and democracy, which has omitted no precaution nor effort, nor sacrificed to vain theories the supreme necessity of national defense, at least the most indispensable of such means and powers. Although deeming them insufficient in certain contingencies for the object sought, I have not cared further to delay the restoration of constitutional guaranties, the suspension of which, I must repeat, no one can rightly claim has been used for purposes of internal politics nor for the purpose of preventing or interfering with the exercise of their rights by any party or person.

Those who wish and whose duty it is to participate in the forthcoming electoral struggle have wide and free avenues open to them in the law and with no other restrictions than those prescribed by law. All may and ought to go to the polls in defense of their respective ideals, of their political aspirations, and of their candidates, with enthusiasm and decision, but also with the composure and discipline proper in free peoples.

To all I offer, whatever their party badges or their purposes or platforms, entire impartiality on the part of the Government and the most effective guaranties for the purity and freedom of suffrage. I hope that all will observe the limits which wisdom and civism impose upon the activities of contestants, and that none will forget that the rights of each must be harmonized with the rights of others and that never as in the present moment has it been so important to raise and dignify party strife by that scrupulous respect for law and order which is the prime necessity of democracies. I pin my faith in that the forthcoming election will be held with the utmost freedom and will be as hard-fought as orderly, without prejudice to the higher sentiments of national solidarity which the state of war ought to awaken in all hearts animated by the pure throbs of patriotism.

M. G. Menocal