"The Cuban question is not a difficult one, because there is an imposed issue. In commercial development, to all evidence, you have been a long time a borrowing country, but to-day you have great banking centres: New York, Philadelphia, and Boston constituting an eastern centre; Chicago, St. Louis, and Cincinnati constituting another; with a smaller one at New Orleans, and a western one at San Francisco. Certain centres, such as the New York one, which has an excess of capital, will act in this annexation of Cuba as a multiple in the matter of capital. The capital will in preference come to Cuba, instead of going west. "In the political problem, the condition of the population of Cuba must be considered. It is not a new country, but four hundred years old,--a totally different nation, with different habits, ways, and languages. Then how can you profitably absorb that population as a State? You cannot afford to sacrifice the United States for Cuba, but must lend Cuba both moral and material riches without forgetting yourself. Is it profitable for the United States to absorb Cuba as a State? If I were an American, I would oppose it. I do not think the Cuban people have sufficient adaptation; in fact they will not Americanise for quite a while, and therefore you must create an empire and a public right that is not within the federal bounds. Your territorial laws pursue colonisation towards the end of absorption, and have placed in your Constitution a limit of population, which we initially possess. Were I an American, I would not be for annexation of Cuba as one of the units of the Union. I think there is a condition of injustice which would be felt by both parties, if you held Cuba in an inferior political state so close to Florida. I say that this is inevitably American, from the material defence which it procures to the United States, and it is a military necessity. It cannot, however, be absorbed and governed rapidly, and for a time you will have to create a new political right, for it is inevitable. You cannot absorb it without creating a different political right.