User:NickDupree/Cuban Question

Black unrest and British pressure to abolish slavery motivated many Creoles to advocate Cuba's annexation by the United States, where slavery was still legal. Other Cubans supported the idea, because they longed for what they considered higher development and democratic freedom. The annexation of Cuba was repeatedly supported by the US. In 1805 President Thomas Jefferson considered possessing Cuba for strategic reasons, sending secret agents to the island to negotiate with Governor Someruelos.

In April 1823, US Secretary of State John Quincy Adams discussed the rules of political gravitation, in a theory often referred to as the "ripe fruit theory". Adams wrote, “There are laws of political as well as physical gravitation; and if an apple severed by its native tree cannot choose but fall to the ground, Cuba, forcibly disjoined from its own unnatural connection with Spain, and incapable of self-support, can gravitate only towards the North American Union which by the same law of nature, cannot cast her off its bosom.” He furthermore warned that “the transfer of Cuba to Great Britain would be an event unpropitious to the interest of this Union.” Adams voiced concern that a country outside of North America would attempt to occupy Cuba upon its separation from Spain. He wrote, “The question both of our right and our power to prevent it, if necessary, by force, already obtrudes itself upon our councils, and the administration is called upon, in the performance of its duties to the nation, at least to use all the means with the competency to guard against and forfend it.”

On 2 December 1823, US President James Monroe specifically addressed Cuba and other European colonies in his proclamation of the Monroe Doctrine. Cuba, located just 94 miles (151 km) from the US city of Key West, was of interest to the doctrine’s founders, as they warned European forces to leave "America for the Americans".

The most outstanding attempts in support of annexation were made by Spanish Army General Narciso López, who prepared four filibuster expeditions to Cuba in the US. The first two, in 1848 and 1849, failed before departure due to US opposition. The third, made up of some 600 men, managed to land in Cuba and take the central city of Cárdenas, but failed eventually due to a lack of popular support. López's fourth expedition landed in Pinar del Río province with around 400 men in August 1851; the invaders were defeated by Spanish troops and López was executed.