The offer made by my predecessor in April, 1896, tendering the friendly
offices of this Government, failed. Any mediation on our part was not
accepted. In brief, the answer read: "There is no effectual way to
pacify Cuba unless it begins with the actual submission of the rebels
to the mother country." Then only could Spain act in the promised
direction, of her own motion and after her own plans.

The cruel policy of concentration was initiated February 16, 1896. The
productive districts controlled by the Spanish armies were depopulated.
The agricultural inhabitants were herded in and about the garrison
towns, their lands laid waste and their dwellings destroyed. This policy
the late cabinet of Spain justified as a necessary measure of war and as
a means of cutting off supplies from the insurgents. It has utterly
failed as a war measure. It was not civilized warfare. It was
extermination.

Against this abuse of the rights of war I have felt constrained on
repeated occasions to enter the firm and earnest protest of this
Government. There was much of public condemnation of the treatment of
American citizens by alleged illegal arrests and long imprisonment
awaiting trial or pending protracted judicial proceedings. I felt it my
first duty to make instant demand for the release or speedy trial of all
American citizens under arrest. Before the change of the Spanish cabinet
in October last twenty-two prisoners, citizens of the United States, had
been given their freedom.

For the relief of our own citizens suffering because of the conflict
the aid of Congress was sought in a special message,[1] and under
the appropriation of May 24, 1897,[2] effective aid has been given to
American citizens in Cuba, many of them at their own request having been