Part 2
"Education will transform this _jíbaro_ into something much better or much worse, for he will not remain content as he is when he can read, write, and see the world with his own eyes. In this education the respect he bears his more fortunate compatriots, the power for good they have over him, and the confidence he reposes in them must be preserved. The labor he must perform to enrich the island must be dignified by his employer and by himself, or else the hills will be deserted and the _jíbaro_ will become a vicious hanger-on of towns. Better homes, better means of communication with towns, now becoming an accomplished fact, better food, education, in which remarkable progress is being made at this day, better habits of life, especially in the modern prevention of disease, must form a part of any plan adopted to improve his condition. The planter who to-day sees the laborer must see in him the man whose bodily, mental, and moral development will make the plantation a success. The planter is the man of all men in Porto Rico who must begin to help the _jíbaro_ upward in order to emerge from his own present industrial depression. This lack of mental contact, of a common ground of interest between the _jíbaro_ and the better class of Porto Ricans drives the former to charlatans for his medical advice, to the wild fruits and vegetables of the interior for his food, and to weird creeds for his religious comfort.
"His dependency causes him to look for protection, for direction and for ideas from the planter, from the municipality, and from the Insular Government. He considers himself a ward of his employer and of those placed in authority over him. He does not care to accept any responsibility for the simple reason that he has always been made to feel that he is not a responsible person. Therefore, how can we blame him when we find him without shoes, knowing that by wearing them he will protect himself against a dangerous infirmity; without bacon and corn, without household furniture, with but one room for his entire family.
"It is a specious excuse, nothing more nor less, which avers that the _jíbaro_ is born the way he is and cannot be changed at this late day, that we must await a new generation, etc. On that principle we could expect very little from the antituberculosis crusades in New York. The truth is that to change the _jíbaro_, we must convince him that he will be bettered by the change, and he is sharp enough to change then, but the gist of all is that these changes must be begun by the men to whom the _jíbaro_ has always looked for light, and this means good hard work and much perseverance, tact, and genuine personal interest. From our acquaintance with the men to whom this burden will fall we should say that they are not only sufficiently good business men to realize the benefit they would get out of a healthy laboring class, but that the innate patriotism of the Porto Rican agriculturist and the deeper underlying sympathy for his _jíbaro_ will some day bring about reforms that they alone can make possible.
"Agricultural laborers, in spite of the small wages they receive, are nearly if not quite as expensive as those in the United States, for with 50 per cent less of efficiency from disease and wasteful methods of work, the difference in wage is of small advantage. Weyl states:
'The small equity which the planter holds in the estate which he cultivates does not permit him to pay any higher wages, and the poverty of the planter prevents him from making the outlay necessary for the proper cultivation of his land.'
"Few coffee planters have anywhere near a reasonable amount of their land under cultivation for the reason that with the poor help and methods now existent they are unable to extend their plant. The regular labor, employed all the year round, the peons--who form a relatively small percentage of the entire number available for work--are paid for a full day's work, and their degree of anemia is such as to prevent their doing but about 50 per cent of what they are paid for doing. Our estimate of the relative efficiency of labor was made from what the planter himself told us and by a simple experiment which we tried upon about 500 adult workers in different parts of the interior. We questioned each one as to the amount of coffee he could pick in a day and found that from two to three _almudes_ was the utmost the majority could do, and that one _almud_ was too much for many. Some stated that after picking a sack full in a remote part of the plantation they were unable to get it in to the mill without a mule, on account of the fact that their limbs refused to bear them up. When these people were working at light work, and at a time when the more they picked, the greater the profit to themselves, is it reasonable to suppose that when working for a wage without this incentive this 50 or 60 per cent labor would be any more efficient? This reduction in laboring capacity demonstrates what a heavy toll is paid by both employer and employee to uncinariasis in Porto Rico.
"As to absentee landlords, Weyl says:
'Many of the absentee owners of Porto Rican properties and many of their agents in Porto Rico consider the island and its population as equally fit for the crassest exploitation, and are as contemptuous of the people as they are enthusiastic about the island. The current use by many Americans of an opprobrious epithet for Porto Ricans bespeaks an attitude which takes no account of the human phase of the problem, but considers the population as composed merely of so many laborers willing to work for such and such a price.'
"Thus the poor laborer, his earning capacity cut down by his disease, with employment which is at best very irregular, with his sick wife and children for whom he has to buy 'iron tonics' that cost all that he can rake and scrape together, without money for clothes, much less for shoes, with a palm-bark hut not too well protected against the damp cold of the grove in which he lives, with not a scrap of furniture save, perhaps, a hammock, and, worst of all, with a miserable diet lacking in proteids and fats, lives from day to day, saving nothing, knowing nothing of the world beyond his plantation, working mechanically simply because he is not the drone he has been too frequently painted outside of Porto Rico, but without any object save to keep on living as generations have done before him. It has been our experience that when he is asked 'Why have you sought our dispensary?' the answer has almost invariably been, 'Because I can no longer work.' The _jíbaro_, nevertheless, has ever been the lever which has raised the bank account of Porto Rico, and with an average of 40 per cent of hemoglobin and two and a half millions of red corpuscles per cubic millimeter he has labored from sun to sun in the coffee plantation of the mountains, in the sugar estate of the coast land, and in the tobacco field of the foothills, in addition to his personal coöperation in other industries and commercial enterprises. He is a sick man and deserves our highest respect, and merits our most careful attention as a vital element in the economic life of the island. The American people should take seriously into account his future, which is at present anything but promising."
OVERPOPULATION
WHEN we say that a country is overpopulated we speak in relative terms, inasmuch as the overpopulation of a country does not depend upon the density of the population alone, but also upon the ability of that country to produce a sufficient amount of foodstuffs to maintain its population. Thus a country which has a relatively small population and a still smaller ability to produce foodstuffs would be more overpopulated than a country of similar size with a larger population and a still greater production of foodstuffs.
In considering the case of Porto Rico, we find that the Island contains 8,317 square kilometers of land. The estimated population at the present time is 1,200,000. This gives about 140 persons to the square kilometer as compared with 72 persons in France, 237 persons in Belgium, and 252 in Saxony. If the productive ability of the soil of Porto Rico is as great as that of Belgium and Saxony, we must conclude that Porto Rico is not overpopulated. If for any reason it is less, then the extent of overpopulation increases directly as the soil grows less in productive ability.
Porto Rico has about ten times as many inhabitants per square acre as the average throughout the United States; but the conditions of climate do a great deal to equalize this difference. In the first place, the soil is available in Porto Rico for the production of crops throughout the twelve months of the year, whereas in parts of the United States and in northern Europe the soil is usable for only a portion of the year on account of its unproductive condition during the winter months. Another matter that must be taken into consideration in the question of overpopulation, is the severity of the climate. Where the climate is severe, the country will maintain in comfort a much smaller population than where the climate is as friendly to the human race as we find it in Porto Rico.
Of the population of Porto Rico in 1910, about 75 per cent lived in communities that had less than 500 inhabitants, showing conclusively that the great majority of the people of Porto Rico should be classified as rural inhabitants and that the problems which affect the rural people of Porto Rico are the problems which would affect, to a great extent, the entire Island. Only two cities in the Island have a population of more than 25,000, while only 30 would fall under the head of urban territory, that is, towns which have a population of 2,500 or more.
The rate of increase of population in Porto Rico is far in excess of the rate of increase in the United States, and this is one of the things that must be taken into consideration in considering the question of overpopulation. In the United States the rate of increase among the class of people whose salaries range from $700 to $2,500 is from ten to twelve per thousand. In Porto Rico, the rate of increase is about twenty per thousand.
The following table shows a comparison between the birth rate, death rate, and rate of increase in the United States and Porto Rico, the figures given representing the birth and death rate for every thousand of the population in each country.
UNITED STATES Birth rate Death rate Increase
_Poor Class_: 35 to 40 25 to 35 5 to 10 _Intermediate class_: 25 to 30 15 to 18 10 to 12 _Well-to-do class_: 12 to 18 12 to 15 4 to 6
PORTO RICO (1914-15) Birth rate Death rate Increase 39.12 19.72 19 to 20
In order to maintain the population of a country, there must be about 400 children between the ages of one and five years for every thousand women between the ages of fifteen and forty-five. The following table shows how Porto Rico compares in this respect with other countries.
United States 492 children per thousand women France 409 " " " " Germany 535 " " " " England 429 " " " " Sweden 522 " " " " Porto Rico 725 " " " "
Thus we see that the rate of increase of the population of Porto Rico is much greater than that of the United States. When we take into consideration the advancement being made in sanitary science in Porto Rico and in the elimination of disease, as well as the increased facilities for caring for sickness, we may expect that the rate of increase here will be augmented each year.
The general opinion is that Porto Rico is so thickly populated that a crisis is inevitable, unless some means is found for remedying the present situation. It does not seem, however, that we are justified in coming to such a conclusion when we consider the much more densely populated countries of Belgium and Saxony. Increased production of the soil due to intensive agriculture, and modern methods of farming, as well as the breaking up of the land into small farms, have been the means of taking care of the vast populations of European countries where climatic conditions are not as favorable as they are in Porto Rico. Of the total acreage of Porto Rico about 94 per cent is in farms, and we find that only 30,000 people are directly dependent upon these farms for their support. Of the total number of acres included in farm land, about 75 per cent is improved and under cultivation, so that there is still about one quarter of the land that can be devoted to agriculture when it has been connected with markets, or by other means rendered available for this purpose. There are in Porto Rico more than 58,000 farms, 46,779 of which are operated by their owners. These, in the great majority of cases, are small farms and are of the kind which bring the greatest amount of benefit to the Island. Some 10,000 farms are operated by tenants, and these farms also are usually small.
The following table shows the number of farms of various sizes in the Island to-day:
Farms under 5 acres 20,650 Farms from 5 to 9 acres 11,309 Farms from 10 to 19 acres 10,045 Farms from 20 to 49 acres 8,872 Farms from 50 to 99 acres 3,728 Farms from 100 to 174 acres 1,726 Farms from 175 to 499 acres 1,502 Farms from 500 to 999 acres 332 Farms of 1000 acres or more 207
Of the owners and tenants of these farms 44,521 are white and 13,850 are colored. About 95 per cent of all the owned farms are free from mortgage. The average size of the farms in Porto Rico is about 35¾ acres.
The experience of European countries has been that large farms, in a densely populated country are detrimental to the community welfare, because the holding of such farms by a few condemns a large percentage of the population to a dependent condition. As the number of farms decreases, the number of salaried laborers must increase, and as this floating population increases, there is also a tendency for crime to increase, as the man who has no responsibilities as a proprietor of land often lacks the fundamental stimulus to make him observe the laws of his country. The landowner, having obtained even a small parcel of land, has an incentive for hard work, wishing to better his financial condition, while the dependent salaried man, with no visible stimulus for saving, tends to spend his money as fast as it is earned and seldom accumulates any property. To such an extent is the possession of land regarded as a benefit to the individual and an incentive toward good citizenship, that in some European countries the government has made arrangements to loan money to worthy young men for the purchase of small farms on the ground that the government gains a desirable citizen every time that it creates a landholder. The Government of Porto Rico might well take some steps to encourage dependent laborers to accumulate property, either by means of loans to those who desire to purchase property, or by opening up government land for settlement under the Homestead Act.
The rise in the price of land and the fact that the greater part of the land of Porto Rico is devoted to industries which are most productive when conducted on a fairly large scale, has tended to the accumulation of large tracts of land, and legal measures should be enacted against the accumulation of tracts of land of more than 100 or 200 acres, and providing for the distribution of any large tracts in case of the death of the present owner:
At the present time a good deal of the foodstuffs of Porto Rico is imported into the Island while if there were more widely extended division of the land into a large number of small farms, the production of these foodstuffs could be greatly increased, although, of course, this would tend to decrease the production of certain other crops which at present claim the chief attention of the people of Porto Rico.
According to the Report of the Governor of Porto Rico for 1914-15, the division of land among the various industries, as well as the average value per acre of land for each of the industries, is shown by the following table:
Average value Crop Acreage per acre
Cane 211,110 $106.95 Coffee 165,170 61.60 Tobacco 18,040 80.81 Pineapples 3,761 105.24 Citrus fruits 5,274 121.78 Coconuts 6,088 118.33 Minor fruits 102,274 27.53
From this table we see that certain industries, such as the cultivation of pineapples or citrus fruits, which can be carried on successfully on relatively small farms, bring practically as high a return per acre as does the production of sugar cane, which is essentially a large farm product. This argument would not necessarily do away with the cultivation of sugar cane, but would tend to increase the cultivation of other crops wherever and whenever the soil and climatic conditions would permit.
An increase in the number of owned farms and a consequent decrease in the number of dependent wage earners, together with the increased production of foodstuffs which such a system of land management would necessarily bring as a result, providing the management of the farms was carried on under modern scientific methods, would, to a great extent, relieve the situation of overpopulation which we now face. Porto Rico can support twice the population which she now has with comparative ease, providing some means is found to relieve the economic situation of the greater part of the people and to prevent the accumulation of wealth in the hands of a comparatively small number. It is estimated at the present time that the wealth of Porto Rico is in the hands of less than 15 per cent of the population, and the remaining 85 per cent are dependent for their living upon daily or monthly wages. Such a situation must be changed or else the question of overpopulation will become indeed serious. There is no particular reason to fear that the population will increase to such an extent that we shall be unable to support ourselves on what the Island may produce; but with the increase of population under present conditions, trouble between capital and labor and between workmen and their employers cannot be avoided.
Emigration as a means of relief to the overpopulation of Porto Rico will not solve the question. In the first place, the Porto Rican people are essentially a home-loving people, clinging closely to family ties and not at all disposed to migrate to other countries. A few cases of Porto Rican families who have moved to other countries have shown that in the majority of instances the migration was not successful. In the second place, in order to relieve the situation at all it would be necessary to provide for the emigration of a large number of families. The removal of 100 or 500 families from Porto Rico would not make any appreciable difference in the economic situation that we find to-day. The average family consists of five people, and the removal of 5,000 unskilled laborers from the Island would not tend to relieve the situation.
The only means of meeting the situation of overpopulation is through increasing the food production of the Island by means of division into small farms, intensive cultivation, and modern methods of farming. The school must do its share in the teaching of small-farm and garden farming, and the Government should assume the responsibility for fostering the increase of the number of small farms as well as for assisting in the educational work to improve the methods of cultivation.
THE FAMILY
THE family is the simplest combination of individuals that we find in organized society and is the basis of social group forms. It ranks in importance as a social institution with the church, the state, and the school, coming into existence before any of these three institutions. It existed in a complete form, consisting of father, mother, and children long before there was such an institution as civil or religious marriage. In the history of mankind, the family and marriage grew up together, the importance of the family requiring certain marriage customs by which the members of the family could be held together to protect the interests of the children.
In Porto Rico we find the average family consisting of five people, and according to the census of 1910, in the total population 15 years of age and over, 43.7 per cent of the males and 38 per cent of the females were single; 36.2 per cent of the males of the total population and 35.4 per cent of the females were married, while 16 per cent of the males (or a total of 50,113), and 15.7 per cent of the females (or a total of 51,073), were consensually married, that is, living together by mutual consent, but without the benefit of a civil or ecclesiastical marriage.[1] This proportion is somewhat lower than it was in 1899, as the percentage of consensual marriages in comparison with the population at that time was 16.3 per cent for the males and 15.2 per cent for the females. The difference, however, does not exceed one half of one per cent, and there were actually 17,046 more people living together consensually in 1910 than in 1899. The seriousness of the situation may be seen when we consider that of the total population of the Island over 15 years of age, 31.7 per cent, nearly one third, representing 101,186 people, are living together without any form of marriage ceremony.
[1] The difference in numbers between men and women living together consensually is doubtless due to the fact that many men who have legitimate wives also have consensual wives or mistresses.
Many reasons have been given for the prevalence of the consensual marriage in Porto Rico, among which are to be found the necessity of the ecclesiastical marriage with its complicated forms and the relatively costly ceremonies which prevailed before the institution of civil marriage under the American Government. It seems quite probable, however, that this custom is a relic of the consensual marriage form, which was established by the early colonizers of Porto Rico, many of whom came to the Island, leaving their families behind, and entered into consensual marriage relations with the native women of the Island. In this way the custom was established, and there was a lack of public opinion against it which has existed down to the present time, and until, through the influence of the schools, public opinion against this form of union can be roused, very little progress will be made in changing conditions.
There is no doubt but that many of the consensual marriages are considered by the parties concerned just as permanent as those performed by civil or ecclesiastical authorities, and the question of immorality does not enter into their view of the situation. It is a question of mutual consent, and especially in the country districts, the knowledge of the law in regard to these matters is very vague. The greatest harm in cases of marriage of this sort lies in the tendency to prevent the spread of public opinion against the custom and in the ease with which the family relations can be broken at the will of either member of the family, with the resulting unprotected condition of the children which may have been born into the family.
The number of persons of illegitimate birth in the Island of Porto Rico, as given by the census of 1899 and that of 1910, is as follows: