Keynote remarks
prepared for delivery by
Kenneth D. McClintock
Puerto Rico Secretary of State
SOMOS 2011 Winter Conference
San Juan, Puerto Rico
Veterans Day 2011
Amigas y amigos puertorriqueños...
hermanas y hermanos hispanos. Although I
could continue speaking in Spanish, for the benefit of the
“culturally-impaired”, I’ll continue in English!
First, I would like to thank SOMOS for
their kind invitation… I am very pleased to have been asked to speak at the
Puerto Rican/Hispanic Task Force Winter Conference. But I do not want to speak
long…
Rather than having you listen to my
concerns and my opinions, I would like this to be an opportunity to exchange
views… to discuss issues… and to strengthen ties with the members of the larger
Hispanic community in New York porque nosotros los puertorriqueños somos
solidarios con nuestras hermanas y hermanos hispanos.
I would like this to become more of a
town hall meeting than a dinner keynote because a town hall meeting helps to
bring together the members of the community, however diverse the community is
—and, let’s face it, it’s Friday night and who wants to listen to me talking
for forty minutes on end…
Latinos are a diverse group, but whether
we are from Mexico, Central America, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic,
or South America, we are bound together not only by our common history and
cultural heritage but also by our concerns and interests… by the goals and objectives
that we share.
By bringing together the members of the
community, we raise awareness about our common concerns and interests and help
foster Hispanic leadership in this great Nation of ours.
A town hall is also the seat of local
government… and a town hall meeting is perhaps the best example of
participatory and representative democracy in America… Therefore, it would be
fitting to begin my remarks by talking about an issue that is at the heart of
what representative democracy means…
Hispanics are taking an active part in
all areas of endeavor and every institution of our democratic society.
Hispanics are having an ever growing
influence in the arts and culture, and we are seeing more and more Hispanics in
the national media.
Our purchasing power has also been
increasing and we are in the marketing plan of every major company in the
United States. In 2009, Hispanics accounted for more than 9% of total buying
power, compared to less than 4% in 1980. The buying power of Hispanics exceeded
$1 trillion in 2010, and the population includes a significant number of
high-income households.
We are doing better in business.
Hispanics in the United States have been opening businesses at a rate that is
three times as fast as the national average. We are driving economic growth and
creating jobs.
Make no mistake about it. Immigrants,
and the sons and daughters of immigrants, helped to build this great Nation of
ours and Hispanics will help to bring this Nation out of recession.
And, more Hispanics become appointed to
key positions in the federal government such as the Director of the Office of
Intergovernmental Affairs at The White House.
Cecilia Muñoz, the highest-ranking
Hispanic in the Executive Office of The President, oversees the Obama
Administration’s relationships with state and local governments. She has done
an extraordinary job at keeping Puerto Rico issues at the top of the agendas of
cabinet members. Not only does she lead and follow-through, but she is also
available at all times. And I can tell you from my experience in government
that finding all three is not a common sight at that high level.
Had it not been for her, President Obama
probably wouyld not have broken last June 14th the 49 and a half year spell of
Presidents not visiting Puerto Rico.
While she doesn’t have a pilot’s license, she was certainly the driving
force when Air Force One flew over our skies five months ago!
But in the White House, she’s not only
in charge of Puerto Rico-related issues although we like to see her that way
here, but in charge of relations with all local governments and
intergovernmental organizations, such as the National Governors Association,
the National Conference of State Legislatures,
the Council of State Governments that I chaired 13 years ago and, among
others, two I’m now active in, the National Lieutenant Governors Association as
well as the National Association of Secretaries of State. And they all speak highly of Cecilia.
Other Hispanics providing leadership in
the Obama administration come to mind among which are: Ambassador Carlos
Pascual, Special Envoy and Coordinator for International Energy Affairs at the
State Department; Julissa Reynoso, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for
Western Hemisphere Affairs who was recently appointed as U.S. Ambassador to
Paraguay; Anna Gómez, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications
and Information; Bill Ramos, Director of Intergovernmental Affairs at the
Office of the Secretary of Commerce; and James Albino, Program Manager at the
Office of National AIDS Policy of The White House.
Yet Hispanics, including Puerto Ricans,
are still underrepresented in politics.
In the case of Puerto Ricans who live in the Islands it is not a
question of under-representation, but rather of lack of representation.
The nearly 4 million American citizens
that reside in Puerto Rico… 4 million Latinos… have no proportional or voting
representation in the U.S. House of Representatives… no representation
whatsoever in the U.S. Senate and no direct participation in the election of
the President and Vice President.
While Congress adopts legislation that
the American citizens of Puerto Rico must abide, our only representation in
Congress is a Resident Commissioner in the House that cannot vote on the
floor. And our only participation in the
election of the President is choosing the delegates to the national political
party conventions. This is simply undemocratic.
I make no secret of the fact that I
favor Puerto Rico becoming a State---if you didn’t get that in the panel
discussion this afternoon, you must’ve been on the beach! But this is not about
political status preferences or party politics. This goes to the heart of
democracy. Let me quote from three lifelong advocates of Puerto Rico’s current
political status known as “commonwealth” or “estado libre asociado”.
In February 2002 former Governor Sila
Calderón was interviewed by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel about a voting
registration drive the Government of Puerto Rico was conducting in the States
and which she described as “an effort to empower Puerto Ricans politically so
that they can be a voice in the issues that affect them.”
Regarding the situation of Puerto Ricans
in the Islands, Governor Calderon said:
We need a solution to this problem of
lack of representation.
Which particular solution at this point,
I cannot tell you. But it is something we must deal with because there are so
many (U.S.) laws that apply to Puerto Rico in which we have no representation
and no participation.
Former Governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, in
his remarks at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy’s School of Government on
April 26th 2002 —he was Resident Commissioner at the time— referred to “the
problem of the current democratic asymmetry in the US-Puerto Rico
relationship”, recognizing the existence of the same problem: that we have no
participation in the decisions that are made in Washington.
Former Governor Rafael Hernández-Colón,
published an article in the 1998 July/August edition of Foreign Affairs
magazine entitled, “Doing Right by Puerto Rico: Congress Must Act.” In that article, he made the following
assertion: “All factions do agree on the need to end the present undemocratic
arrangement, whereby Puerto Rico is subject to the laws of Congress but cannot
vote in it [emphasis provided].”
At Harvard, Governor Acevedo Vilá spoke
of building a new consensus, but it seems that we are already before a strong
one. The current political status is unacceptable and we need to give the
people a full self-government choice.
Has Congress lived-up to its
responsibility in making possible that choice? No. On three occasions the U.S.
Senate had the opportunity to take action on bills passed in the House —in 1998
with H.R. 856; in 2007 with H.R. 900; and in 2010 H.R. 2499— but didn’t.
And because Congress has failed to take
action to solve Puerto Rico’s political status problem, Hispanics are losing
the opportunity to have a larger and more powerful voice in our Nation’s
Capital. Think of this: if Puerto Rico
were a State, Hispanics would have two more Senators and five more
Representatives in Congress. And, would immigration reform be held-up in a
Congress with a full delegation of Senators and Representatives from Puerto
Rico? I don’t think so!
It is not that Congress has failed to
give sufficient consideration to this question.
During the last 20 years Congress has devoted a prodigious amount of
time to discuss the question Puerto Rico’s political status. But the time spent on hearings did not
translate into a law to provide the American citizens of Puerto Rico the
opportunity to choose among status options that are constitutionally sound,
politically viable, and involve a full measure of self-government.
In fact, during the one hundred and
twelve years after the annexation of Puerto Rico, Congress did not sponsor a
single plebiscite to resolve the Islands’ political status.
Let me quote once more from former
Governor Hernández Colón’s article in FOREIGN AFFAIRS:
“It is morally unacceptable, unfair, and
harmful to Puerto Rico and the United States for Congress to relegate the issue
to business as usual —that is, do nothing, wait for a Puerto Rican initiative,
play with it for a while but take no action, wait for the next initiative, and
repeat the cycle. Such insensitivity
undermines Puerto Rico’s capacity for self-government, inflicts considerable
hardship on its society, and drains the U.S. Treasury.”
We could not keep waiting for Congress.
That is why the administration of Governor Fortuño has taken action to
establish a two-step process by which the people of Puerto Rico can choose a
final and permanent political status with full self-government.
The first step will be a referendum to
be held on August 12, 2012. Voters will be asked whether they want to maintain
the current status under the territorial clause of the U.S. Constitution or
whether they prefer a non-territorial option.
If more voters choose a non-territorial
option, a plebiscite would take place on the same day as the general election
in November 6, 2012, giving voters the three status options recognized by the
U.N. General Assembly as full-self-government choices: statehood, independence
or free association.
At the heart of this issue is that the
founders of this Nation meant for the citizenship of the United States to be a
source of equal rights but that four million American citizens who reside in
Puerto Rico do not have the same rights as those who live in the States.
If citizenship is to truly be a source
of equal rights in America, Puerto Rico’s political status must change. The
options are obvious: either the people of Puerto Rico continue to be American
citizens with all its rights and responsibilities under statehood or they
achieve separate sovereignty be it under complete independence or a compact of
free association with the United States.
Some may ask, why am I addressing this?
I’ll tell you… Because Puerto Ricans in the States and in the Islands need to
stand together…
…because Puerto Ricans in the Islands
and Latinos in the States are part of the same fabric…
…because Puerto Rico’s political status
problem diminishes the political power of Hispanics in the States.
…and because the voting and
representation rights that Puerto Rican’s in the Islands lack underscore the
value of the exercising the rights that you have in the States.
To those Puerto Ricans who live in the
States; I would like to ask: Do you feel boricua? Of course you do… You don’t
feel any less boricua because you can vote.
Los boricuas en la Isla y en los estados
ya estamos unidos por la identidad de la cultura; es hora que también estemos
unidos por el poder del voto. Y, cuando todos los puertorriqueños —los de aquí
y los de allá— tengamos el poder del voto, entonces sí que nadie podrá
detenernos.
For now, Puerto Ricans who live in the
Islands cannot vote to elect Senators or Representatives to Congress and cannot
vote to elect the President but those of you who live in the States can and
should vote.
Voting is not an option but a necessary
and fundamental part of being a citizen in a democratic society and if you are
registered to vote not only are you equipped to further you own goals and
objectives… but can also be solidarios with the members of the community to
which we belong —con nuestras hermanas y hermanos hispanos.
Can your vote make a difference? The
answer is an unequivocal and resounding yes!
History provides many examples of how a
single vote changed the course of entire nations. Let me give you an example. Most of us would
not conceive of this country without Texas being a part of it, but Texas may
not have been admitted into the Union if it was not because of the vote of a
farmer in the backwoods of Switzerland County, Indiana, named Freeman Clark.
On Election Day in 1844 Freeman Clark
laid seriously ill in bed. He begged his sons to carry him to the county seat
so he could vote for David Kelso, the Democratic candidate for the State
Senate. Clark owed him. David Kelso had defended Clark on a murder charge and
obtained his acquittal. The old farmer got to vote for Kelso but Clark died on
his way back home. Guess what? Kelso won the election by one vote…
In 1844 when the new Indiana Senate
convened, Democrats had a majority of one —counting, you guessed it, David
Kelso. At that time, State senates had the task of electing the States'
delegation to the U.S. Senate. The Indiana Senate Democrats held a caucus where
a majority of the party delegation favored a man who would vote against the
annexation of Texas if elected to the U.S. Senate. David Kelso refused to vote
for the Democratic Party choice and a deadlock resulted between the Democratic
and Whig candidates. The impasse continued for days. Finally, Kelso made his
move. He proposed a new candidate: Edward A. Hannigan. In his party caucus,
Kelso notified his Democratic colleagues he would bolt and vote with the Whigs
—thus electing a Whig to the U.S. Senate— unless the Democrats supported
Hannigan. The Democrats felt constrained to accept Hannigan who was then
elected as U.S. Senator for the State of Indiana by one vote —that of David
Kelso.
In 1845, Texas was admitted to the Union
as a State by one vote —that of Edward A. Hannigan from Indiana. California too
was admitted to the Union by a margin of one vote in 1850.
In the 1960 presidential election, one
more vote per precinct in the states of Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, and
Texas may have altered the course of America's modern history by denying John
F. Kennedy the presidency and placing Richard Nixon in the White House 8 years
earlier.
In 1962, the governors of Maine, Rhode
Island, and North Dakota were all elected by a margin of one vote per precinct.
Your vote makes a difference and
registering to vote is easy. What is
most exciting is that Latinos are one of the fastest growing ethnic groups in
the United States and they have the potential of transforming the electoral
landscape of this country next November as the nation elects the next President
of the United States. In fact, many
analysts predict that the presidential race in 2011 will turn on how Latinos
vote in several key States.
If one vote can change the course of a
nation’s history, just imagine the unrealized potential for change as millions
of Hispanic men and women cast their votes.
However, Latinos will only realize their
true political potential in this democratic society if you are registered to
vote and go to polls. Your vote will make a difference in this country next
November.
I will not take more time… As I said, I
want to listen to your views. I would
like to close by thanking you for this extraordinary opportunity… gracias por
la oportunidad de dirigirme a ustedes… and we look forward to strengthening our
ties to Latinos in New York as we endeavor to increase and improve the
participation of Hispanics in America.¡Juntos podemos alcanzar nuestras metas y
juntos triunfaremos!
Ahora me
gustaría escuchar sus comentarios y responder a sus preguntas. Así que los que tengan preguntas o
comentarios por favor levanten la mano.
