Pedro Albizu Campos
However, animus towards his African heritage led to his professors delaying two of his final exams in order to keep Albizu Campos from graduating on time.He was born in a sector of Barrio Machuelo Abajo[8] in Ponce, Puerto Rico to Juliana Campos, a domestic worker of African ancestry, on June 29, 1893.He was fluent in six modern and two classical languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, and ancient Greek.[16] Albizu Campos left the United States, took and passed the required two exams in Puerto Rico, and in June 1922 received his law degree by mail.[21] Several years after leaving Puerto Rico, in 1913 Charles Herbert Allen, the former first civilian U.S. governor of the island, became president of the American Sugar Refining Company,[22] the largest of its kind in the world.[23] Nationalist activists wanted independence from foreign banks, absentee plantation owners, and United States colonial rule.They gained legislative approval to repatriate the remains of Ramón Emeterio Betances, the Puerto Rican patriot, from Paris, France.In 1927, Albizu Campos traveled to Santo Domingo, Haiti, Cuba, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela, seeking support among other Latin Americans for the Puerto Rican Independence movement.[27] In 1932, Albizu published a letter accusing Dr. Cornelius P. Rhoads, an American pathologist with the Rockefeller Institute, of killing Puerto Rican patients in San Juan's Presbyterian Hospital as part of his medical research.The matter of consideration for the patients' welfare plays no role here – in fact all physicians take delight in the abuse and torture of the unfortunate subjects.It changed the country into a huge sugar plantation ..." Albizu Campos accused Rhoads and the United States of trying to exterminate the native population, saying, "Evidently, submissive people coming under the North American empire, under the shadow of its flag, are taken ill and die.He went on, "It [the Rockefeller Foundation] has in fact been working out a plan to exterminate our people by inoculating patients unfortunate enough to go to them with virus of incurable diseases such as cancer.[31] The Nationalist Party obtained poor electoral results in the 1932 election, but continued its campaign to unite the island behind an independent Puerto Rico platform.In 1933, Albizu Campos led a strike against the Puerto Rico Railway and Light and Power Company for its alleged monopoly on the island.The Nationalist movement was intensified by some of its members being killed by police during unrest at the University of Puerto Rico in 1935, in what was called the Río Piedras Massacre.In 1936, Hiram Rosado and Elías Beauchamp, two members of the Cadets of the Republic, the Nationalist youth organization, assassinated Colonel Riggs.The Nationalists believed these showed the violence which the United States was prepared to use in order to maintain its colonial regime in Puerto Rico.[36] Historians Manuel Maldonado-Denis and César Ayala believe the motive for this repression, especially during the Great Depression, was because United States business interests were earning such enormous profits by this colonial arrangement.[38] The prosecution based some of its charges on the Nationalists' creation and organization of the Cadets, which the government referred to as the "Liberating Army of Puerto Rico".In 1939, United States Congressman Vito Marcantonio, strongly criticized the proceedings, calling the trial a "frame-up" and "one of the blackest pages in the history of American jurisprudence."[43] In his speech Five Years of Tyranny in Puerto Rico, Congressman Marcantonio said that Albizu's jury had been profoundly prejudiced since it had been hand-picked by the prosecuting attorney Cecil Snyder.Among the more notable of the revolts was the Jayuya uprising, where a group of Puerto Rican Nationalists, under the leadership of Blanca Canales, held the town of Jayuya for three days; the Utuado uprising which culminated in what is known as the "Utuado Massacre"; and the attack on La Fortaleza (the Puerto Rican governor's mansion) during the Nationalist attack of San Juan.Overnight Santiago Díaz, the barber who survived an armed attack by forty police and National Guardsmen, became a legend throughout Puerto Rico.Albizu was pardoned in 1953 by then-governor Luis Muñoz Marín but the pardon was revoked the following year after the 1954 United States Capitol shooting incident, when four Puerto Rican Nationalists, led by Lolita Lebrón, opened fire from the gallery of the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.[52] Though in ill health, Pedro Albizu Campos was arrested when Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andrés Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and opened fire on the members of the 83rd Congress on March 1, 1954, with the intention of capturing world-wide attention to the cause of Puerto Rican independence.Lolita Lebrón called him "Puerto Rico's most visionary leader"[62] and nationalists consider him "one of the island's greatest patriots of the 20th century."[63] In describing his legacy, social scientist Juan Manuel Carrión wrote that "Albizu still represents a forceful challenge to the very fabric of [Puerto Rico's] colonial political order."[64] His followers state that Albizu's political and military actions served as a primer for positive change in Puerto Rico, including the improvement of labor conditions for peasants and workers, a more accurate assessment of the colonial relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States, and an awareness by the political establishment in Washington, D.C. of this colonial relationship.[66] His critics say that he "failed to attract and offer concrete solutions to the struggling poor and working class people and thus was unable to spread the revolution to the masses."[67] The revival of public observance of the Grito de Lares and its significant icons was a result of Albizu Campos's efforts as the leader of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party.
Spanish namesurnameHarvard UniversityMachuelo AbajoPonce, Puerto RicoSan Juan, Puerto RicoUniversity of VermontPuerto Rican Nationalist PartyPuerto RicanNationalist PartyRío Piedras massacrePonce massacreCadets of the RepublicGag Law (Ley de la Mordaza)Puerto Rican Nationalist Party revolts of the 1950sJayuya UprisingSan Juan Nationalist revoltUtuado uprisingAttempted assassination of Harry S. Truman1954 United States Capitol shootingJosé S. AlegríaCasimiro BerenguerBlanca CanalesRafael Cancel MirandaJosé Coll y CuchíOscar CollazoRosa CollazoJuan Antonio CorretjerJulia de BurgosRaimundo Díaz PachecoLolita LebrónTomás López de VictoriaHugo MargenatFrancisco Matos PaoliRuth Mary ReynoldsIsolina RondónVidal Santiago DíazClemente Soto VélezGriselio TorresolaAntonio Vélez AlvaradoCarlos Vélez RieckehoffOlga Viscal GarrigaMargot Arce de VázquezElías BeauchampCarmelo Delgado DelgadoAndres Figueroa CorderoIrvin FloresIsabel Freire de MatosHiram RosadoIsabel RosadoJosé Ferrer CanalesRené MarquésPedro "Davilita" Ortiz DávilaGermán RieckehoffHelen Rodríguez TríasDaniel SantosTeófilo Villavicencio MarxuachFélix Benítez RexachPuerto Rican independence movementNationalist Party of Puerto Riconationalist revolts of October 1950Puerto RicoHarvard Law SchoolIrish struggle for independencepolyglotstrokeAfrican ancestryBasqueVenezuelaJuan Morel CamposCarlos Albizu MirandaPonce High SchoolChemical EngineeringInfantryCamp Las CasasracismSubhas Chandra BoseRabindranath TagoreIndian independenceBostonIrish independenceÉamon de ValeraIrish Free StateKnights of ColumbusCatholicHarvard CollegeU.S. State DepartmentUniversity of Puerto RicoLaura MenesesPeruvianbiochemistSpanish EmpirePráxedes Mateo SagastaSpanish CortesTreaty of ParisSpanish–American WarCharles Herbert AllenAmerican Sugar Refining CompanyDomino Sugargovernorshipcontrolling interesteconomyUnion Party of Puerto RicoSan JuanRamón Emeterio BetancesIndependence Association of Puerto RicoLeopoldo FigueroaRicardo AlegríaSanto DomingoPanamaPuerto Rican IndependenceUnion PartyViequesCornelius P. RhoadsRockefeller InstituteLeague of NationsPan American UnionAmerican Civil Liberties Unionthe VaticanJames R. BeverleyRockefeller FoundationAmerican Association for Cancer ResearchEl Imparcialstrikemonopolysugar canefederal grand jury