ed to the slave-holding
domain. On the other hand, the anti-slavery party, because of its
abhorrence of these schemes, opposed the manifestation of what would
have been a quite legitimate and benevolent interest in Cuban affairs.
For forty years Cuba was a pawn in the game between these contending
factions. Of course this issue was disposed of by the Civil War and the
consequent abolition of slavery in the United States.

Another issue was that of expansion. There was from the first a
considerable party in the United States that favored the widest possible
acquisition of territory, sometimes quite regardless of the means, and
it early fixed upon Cuba as what Jefferson and the younger Adams had
declared it to be, the most interesting and most natural addition that
could be made to the federal system. There was also a party that was
resolutely opposed to any further extension of American territorial
sovereignty, whether by conquest or purchase. Sometimes the one and
sometimes the other of these prevailed in American politics, and not
infrequently Cuba was the chief issue between them. Ultimately it was
over Cuba that their greatest conflict was waged; resulting in a
compromise, under which the United States on the one hand renounced all
designs of annexing Cuba, and on the other hand did annex other still
more extensive territories.

The third of these issues was that of the tariff. Commercial relations
between Cuba and the United States were naturally intimate and important
to both countries, and afforded scope for almost endless discussions
concerning and manipulations of tariff duties. It was in the power of
the United States to enhance or to depress the prosperity of Cuba, by
the adjustment of tariff rates. To admit Cuban sugar, not to mention
tobacco, freely or at a low duty, into the American market meant
prosperity for the island. To place a high tariff rate upon it meant
hard times if not disaster in Cuba. During the period between the Ten
Years' War and the War of Independence in Cuba, such tariff changes very
seriously affected the economic and also the political condition of
Cuba; and the final withdrawal of the reciprocity arrangement which had
opened American markets to Cuba was one of the chief provoking causes of
the final revolution in the island. That revolution would doubtless have
come, in any case, but it was measurably hastened and exacerbated by the
economic distress which was thus precipitated upon