this moment you have seen equality, what you call the fairness of the process, because you are going to give half a million dollars to each party, and that does not overcome the deficiencies. It does not overcome the enormous disadvantages of independence in a plebiscite. Look, there are 91 years of colonial power, of telling us, the independence movement, that we are illegal in this country, of suffering persecution, by the FBI, the agencies, here, there and everywhere, that to be a member of the Independence Party is bad because you can lose your jobs, and there are few jobs in the country. And the policy of North America has been in Puerto Rico to be synonyms of independence with something illegal, and that is not erased in one or two years. That requires a process of healing. And that is why I say that international has compiled this experience in the decolonization of people, and the established transfer of power, and giving sovereignty to that people, and what is free determination. How do you think that a Puerto Rican can vote freely, because he is locked into a job and he is alone, and if he goes and they say if independence comes, you lose your veterans' benefits, and that is the only thing coming in; so they tell the recipient of the social security, if you vote for independence, you are going to lose you social security, lose your food stamps. That man, that woman cannot vote freely. They cannot exercise the right to free determination, and that is what I want you to understand; that this cannot be an exclusive, normal process as any other colonial-congressional legislation, I am sorry. And this process we have lived under. Senator Moynihan was an Ambassador of the United States to the United Nations and was one of the big opponents that we should take this case to the Decolonizing Committee. And he knows what international law applies to colonial people. So this is not an internal affairs of yours, as you have tried to make it seem in the international community. Do not involve the international community with Puerto Rico because that is an internal matter of the United States. Colonial matters are not internal matters of the metropolis. That is why humanity has declared the decade of the 1990s to the year 2000 for the total eradication of colonialism, and that is an international matter. And in your international policies, the colonial status of Puerto Rico is and you are in the bench as the biggest colonial power of this decade. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Let me say one thing on which we clearly disagree. Freedom of speech exists in Puerto Rico. Mr. GALLISA. Not here, not here today. We have paid a very high price, we who favor independence, to make our right to free expression. We had to recently defy a ruling from Federal court which prohibited us from carrying out demonstrations and picketing in the streets next to that Federal court. So it has not been easy, and if we have a newspaper today like Claridad for our movement, it is because it has cost a lot of blood and work to be able to have this paper in Puerto Rico. So it has not been easy to have freedom of expression for us who favor independence in Puerto Rico. The CHAIRMAN. Senator McClure. Senator MOYNIHAN. Mr. Chairman, just for the record, I would like to thank Mr. Gallisa for his views, with which I am generally familiar. I would like to make it a point not to dispute but simply with respect to the United Nations resolution, General Assembly resolutions. They have standing in international affairs and command attention, but they are not international law and would not be recognized in a court as such. Thanks. The CHAIRMAN. I appreciate that comment from the former United States representative to the United States. Thank you very much, Mr. Gallisa. Finally, this morning we would like to welcome Mr. Juan Mari Bras, former Secretary General of the Puerto Rican Socialist Party. He is accompanied by Dr. Jose Milton Soltero. STATEMENT OF JUAN MARI BRAS, FORMER SECRETARY GENERAL, PUERTO RICAN SOCIALIST PARTY, ACCOMPANIED BY JOSE MILTON SOLTERO Mr. BRAS. Senators, the presentation we have brought to you from the two organizations that I represent, which are Cause Comun Independentista, a nonsectarian, nonpolitical organization, and the other one, the Puerto Rican Committee at the United Nations, the first one dedicated to promotion of Puerto Rican cultural values and the ideal of independence for our people, which is dedicated towards coordinating the international effort at the level of the United Nations between the different patriotic organizations. This presentation, to be brief, since I see that you are anxious to leave for lunch, I would leave it to be introduced in the record in its totality. And I will say to you that the two organizations that I represent are 100 percent in favor, with no dissidence of the presentation that was given to you by Ruben Berrios Martinez, the President of the Partido Independentista Puerto Rico, and the one that was given to you this morning by Carlos Gallisa, the General Secretary of the Puerto Rican Socialist Party. As you can see, both participations present different aspects, but equally important, of the colonial problem in Puerto Rico from the point of view of the independence movement. And you will see that the whole of the independence movement shares a common starting point. Puerto Rico is still a colony in the modern sense of the word. It is people who are run by a foreign government, and in that sense, your participation in this process is the participation of the legislation. When you analyze the constitutional authority that is invested upon you to legislate on behalf of the United States, this authority emanates from a glorious independence revolution which produced the Declaration of Independence and the foundation of the first independent, sovereign states in the American hemisphere. But it is not that glorious, not even that, your participation, your dominion over Puerto Rico, the beginning of that was an armed in vasion in which you, with force, bombed the walls of San Juan, very close to where we are now, and later invaded our island from the port of Guanica, and later imposed on Spain that was defeated in that war, you imposed on them the transfer of Puerto Rico as war bounty, as if we were merchandise that could be thrown about. This fact you have not erased from your history at this moment-and it is our intention to go back to this fact-if we are really going to decolonize. For this reason, by supporting the presentation of Gallisa, I will not go into any of the details which have been sufficiently underlined, with the emphasis on the respect that a patriot always speaks and expresses things relating to his fatherland, and as he spoke to you this morning. What I want to do is restrict my additional intervention to the problem of process. As you will see by this process of referendum that I speak on, with bill 710, 711, and 712, we are approaching a one-way street where we are again bumping into ourselves, where the congressional factions and of different factions that represent Puerto Rican public opinion for this reason. So if you really have the intention of involving yourselves in the process of decolonizing Puerto Rico, then we propose to you an alternate process to that which you have begun, which could very well be established through amendments to the legislation that is already on the way. The procedure would consist that each one would have to comply with the functions that are incumbent in settling this great mess, the mess that the annexionists and the procommonwealth forces have been enmeshed, even though you are the ones who have started this mess. What you have to do is comply with the international mandate of transferring to the people of Puerto Rico the full authority, that you have been using these people for 91 years, so that we as Puerto Ricans can freely deliberate, discuss, and conclude whatever it is that we will decide in including everybody today that has come to speak to you. This is why in order for this process to work, you must resign-the Congress of the United States must resign jurisdiction, and that would be proof that you are really seeking decolonization. And at the same time, a deliberative body of Puerto Ricans would agree on a proposal for the international and, in particular, the political body that might be created with the other political body, that is, yourselves. And this commission, this deliberative body, would at the same time have the function and the representatives by the different branches of power in the United States. * * There has to be. That is the only way in which in harmonious fashion the process of decolonization can be carried out. In the Bar Association of Puerto Rico we have many different representatives from different parties, even though they might be antagonistic to each other, and they have come to speak here and in the Washington hearings. If this procedure continues, then we could reach a consensus of all the parties involved in this decision, including the United States and the different branches of government, and the political parties that control political life in the United States and in Puerto Rico, the political parties in Puerto Rico, the different branches of government in Puerto Rico and social forces in general. Outside of this there is no possibility of a consensus. And it would be a waste of time to continue to insist on a referendum, that you would see in the present San Juan that the Popular Democratic Party, as well as the Independence Party, have made clear their positions that indicate that the project, as it appears now, they would not participate, either of the two parties, in this referendum. And when the process gets more involved, you will see that it will be more difficult each day to carry out this process of referendum that you wish to carry out. I would like to make clear that the independence-seeking sector of Puerto Rico that custodies the national values of our country, of our fatherland, will not settle for anything less than the complete transferrence of powers to our people, and freely exercised sovereignty by the Puerto Rican people, in which case, then, those of us that believe in annexation prevail, and then they could freely become part of the United States. If those who believe in some sort of association with the United States would prevail, then through some treaty they could associate themselves with the United States. But outside of that, there is no possibility of making international law and American law agree. American law has permitted the anomaly of this country that was born as the first decolonized nation of America should today be insisting on being the last country that resists the process of decolonization of the world. Tomorrow, thousands of independentistas will march by you. You will hear them, you will see them. You will see that this fatherland of ours is not-you will not be able to assimilate it, that it has a vitality and a power of resistance superior to all the tricks and deception that might be carried out at the level of the United States Congress or whatever, if you intend to smother an identity that has been able to resist the overwhelming eventuation of 91 years of incessant colonialism that you have imposed by the power of arms on our people. Thank you very much. The CHAIRMAN. As I understand it, you want for us first to give Puerto Rico independence and then have the people of Puerto Rico decide as to status? Mr. BRAS. First, to straighten out the problem that caused everything, which was your intervention- The CHAIRMAN. Excuse me. If you could just give me a yes or no. Is that correct? Mr. BRAS. No, not correct, because you are not the ones who could give us independence. Independence is given by natural right. You must recognize the fact that we are a nation which is duly constituted, that we are not an invention of anyone. That is a people that has been based on 500 years of history. The CHAIRMAN. Well, I must have misunderstood. I thought that you first wanted to get independence and then have a vote. I take it you do not endorse a process whereby the people of Puerto Rico would have the right to choose between independence, statehood, and commonwealth. Mr. BRAS. I am not going to support the process by which you would condition, as you are conditioning in these bills, the decisions of the people of Puerto Rico where you can, as arbitrators, sit down and tell Romero Barcelo these are the conditions that we are willing to accept statehood, and to Hernandez Colon to break down his montage of the culmination or enhancement of the commonwealth, and Ruben Berrios, tell him how you are willing to leave our social security checks for us, because that is not your power. You have to guarantee the right of the social security pensionees in independence, because that is a vested right. In studying these alternatives as pro counsels, I do not accept that. The CHAIRMAN. In the testimony in Washington I asked Mr. Berrios the question, "If the Puerto Rican people opted for independence, would it not be appropriate then to have them make a choice as to citizenship, American citizenship or Puerto Rican citizenship?" Then there followed an exchange, and then Senator Berrios made this answer, "I can assure you that all of the independentistas will renounce American citizenship the next day after independence." My question is: Do you agree with that statement? Mr. BRAS. Yes. There is no doubt that this would be so-the independence people of Puerto Rico would assume with pride at the instant that the republic is proclaimed the citizenship of the Republic of Puerto Rico. But the independence people and other Puerto Ricans who live in the United States shall have to decide which of the two citizenships they will choose at a given moment, that they must make a definition; because they have established a modus vivendi in the United States, and we do not pretend to force them to convert themselves into foreigners in a country where they reside. But the independence proponents would guarantee to those Puerto Ricans that the moment they return to Puerto Rico, whenever it is in the course of their lives, they can enjoy the full citizenship of the Republic of Puerto Rico, even though they have maintained themselves as North American citizens there. And that is a problem that is of our interest and not the United States. The CHAIRMAN. In the event of independence, would you expect the United States to continue to give 936 benefits, social security benefits, foodstamps, et cetera? Mr. BRAS. Not only do I expect it, but I am sure because the acquired rights cannot be denied, and the right that I have when I receive social security benefits as a beneficiary of social security is one that I acquired by paying into that fund as a person during my entire useful life, and no one can take that away from me. At least that is what the Constitution of the United States says when they say that nobody's property can be taken from them without due process of law. So this is a problem, not something that you can give or take away. You must guarantee that. The CHAIRMAN. Suppose someone has paid in but has not yet retired. What do you envision as his rights? Mr. BRAS. Oh, in the case of people who are not beneficiaries at the moment of the transfer of power, in that case what must be done is to reach an agreement on the return to the Republic of Puerto Rico of the funds which have been accumulated by our con |