Approximate percentage of whole expenditure Education.......................................... 27.1 Public works, street cleaning, etc................. 27. Police............................................. 8.4 Administrative expenses (salaries of municipal officials and cost of tax collection).............. 7.5 Public lighting.................................... 7. Sanitation......................................... 4. Charity............................................ 2.2 Municipal debts.................................... 1.9 Miscellaneous...................................... 14.2 ------ 100. In view of the lack of resources or interest on the part of municipalities and the central government, services of a public nature have frequently been assumed by private initiative. Many clubs and lodges maintain schools. Firemen's corps, where there are any, are volunteer organizations. For charity work, hospitals, educational work, etc., local committees are formed which raise funds by private subscription or by lottery, and in a number of towns the embellishment of the plazas is in charge of a "junta de ornato." CHAPTER XXIII THE FUTURE OF SANTO DOMINGO Attraction by the United States.--Political future of Santo Domingo.--Economic future of Santo Domingo. The history of the Dominican Republic affords a striking illustration of the rule that large bodies attract nearby smaller or weaker bodies whether in the world of physics or in international politics. The United States of America had scarcely become a nation when it began to absorb contiguous territory and exert a strong attraction on Cuba. With respect to Santo Domingo also, there was such attraction, as became evident in proposals for annexation or the establishment of a naval station. At times it appeared that the process was definitely checked, as when Spain annexed Santo Domingo in 1861, and when the United States Senate refused to annex the country in 1871, and when the Dominican Government cancelled the Samana Bay Concession in 1874, but these acts merely set back the clock of time which they could not stop. When Porto Rico and Cuba were occupied by the United States the attraction exerted on Santo Domingo was powerfully increased. From that time on the Dominican Republic was in fact a protectorate of the United States, though neither American nor Dominican statesmen would have admitted it. The modus vivendi of 1905 and the fiscal convention of 1907 gave expression, in part, to relations actually existing.