1940: Puerto Rico

Political Matters.

Admiral William D. Leahy left Puerto Rico on Nov. 28 after an active governorship of little over a year, to become United States Ambassador to France. Dr. José Miguel Gallardo, a native Puerto Rican and Commissioner of Education since 1937, was appointed Acting-Governor to be succeeded early in 1941 by the island's auditor, Guy J. Swope. The local press expressed widespread regret over Admiral Leahy's departure and praised his administrative ability as well as his capacity for work, but leaders of the Coalitionists who, until the November elections, controlled the legislature, rejoiced at his appointment to Vichy. In these elections the new Popular Democratic Party of Luis Muñoz Marín won the majority of seats in the Senate, entitling it to elect its leader President of that body, and ran a close second in the Lower House. The new party is the party of the 'jíbaros' or small farmers. Its platform advocated independence for Puerto Rico but placed statehood as of 'equal dignity,' if that should be the people's choice in a special plebiscite. Its slogan is 'bread, land, liberty.' Another new tri-partite Unification Party broke away from the Coalitionists under the leadership of Miguel García Méndez, Speaker of the House, in July, and proclaimed statehood as its platform. This last political grouping united the labor and liberal groups and part of the Union Republicans. Bolívar Pagán, a Coalitionist, was elected Resident Commissioner in Washington.

Defense Preparations.

In spite of the appeal made by the Nationalist Party, independence advocate and not politically active, over 200,000 Puerto Ricans registered for military service under the Selective Service Act. A greatly expanded defense program for Puerto Rico, which is being transformed into a 'Gibraltar' of the Caribbean, removes all shadow of possibility of independence for the island. Naval and army air bases at San Juan and Punta Borinquen and the West Indian bases leased from Great Britain will constitute a strategic network in the Caribbean deemed highly essential to hemisphere defense. Admiral Leahy had recommended, furthermore, the acquisition of bases in the French and Dutch island possessions in the Caribbean.

After a three-week conference in Washington, in October, on island defense and the financing of the WPA in Puerto Rico, Admiral Leahy reported that an additional 10,000 workers would be added to the WPA rolls, bringing the total to 30,000, more than 40 per cent of whom would be employed in constructing a naval submarine and sea base and an army air base, to cost about $100,000,000. Early in the year the Governor had urged liberal Federal aid for the island's unemployed. The unemployment figure in December was reported by him to be about 150,000, of whom 40,000 were in the needlework trades.

Industrial Situation.

In the Governor's first message to the legislature on Feb. 13, distressing industrial conditions were attributed to the restricted sugar industry, which is hampered by the drastic quota system, and to the application of Continental wages and hours legislation to the very different local conditions existing on the island, adversely affecting Puerto Rico's second industry. An Industries Committee, instructed to investigate labor conditions preliminary to recommending a possible lower wages and hours scale than the present statutory minimum of 30 cents per hour, started proceedings on Sept. 23. Its report to Col. Philip B. Fleming, Federal Wages and Hours Administrator, recommended a minimum of 12½ cents an hour for home workers and 20 to 22½ cents for shop and factory workers. The committee maintained that a substantial wage increase, which was necessary if the malnutrition and poor health of the working population were to be alleviated, should be given, however, only if tariff aid, such as an adequate import duty, were imposed on products of all competing countries. Otherwise, shutdown and increased unemployment of needleworkers would result. When work is plentiful in this industry, the number of employed runs as high as 75,000 (including home and factory workers), and in its biggest year, 1938, goods processed in the island had an estimated value of $21,000,000.

Finance, Education, Legislation.

Although the Governor's predictions in February for the next year's departmental budget were pessimistic, estimating revenues not to exceed $14,000,000, the general improvement in the Insular government revenues resulted in collections for the year ending in June as high as $16,867,932, exceeding the treasury's original estimates by $4,567,932, and the closing treasury balance showed a gain of $1,344,628 over the previous year. Temporary suspension of the quota system during the latter part of 1939, permitting the sale of 170,000 tons of surplus sugar, increased the volume of sugar exports and was a factor in this improvement. Defense payrolls constituted another factor. The marketing quota for 1941 allotted to Puerto Rico is 797,982 short tons, raw value, out of a total established by the United States Department of Agriculture of 6,616,817 short tons.

Public school enrollment in the island totalled 286,089 in the year ending in June, which is the largest ever recorded. Expansion of the health program under the Social Security Act resulted in the lowest death rate of 17.8 per thousand.

The United States Supreme Court decision upheld the law limiting to 500 acres the amount of land permitted agricultural corporations, in the case of Rubert Hermanos, Inc., which owned 12,188 acres and is the property chiefly of Manuel Gonzáles, who is the island's largest landowner. Senator Luis Muñoz Marín led the fight for enforcement of this law, which is designed to end some of the worst features of absentee landlordism. It does not apply to individual ownership.