Another post about Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico is currently a territory of the United States of America. As it stands, it does not have representation within it's main legislative branch, Congress.Nor does it have the ability to vote for President of the United States of America. This makes the subject of statehood a rather contentious one. Several attempts in the territory's history have been made trying to attain statehood, but so far they have repeatedly failed. That is, until recently. As a result of the conditions that permeated under former President Trump, Puerto Rico held a referendum on the territory's potential statehood. According to the final tally, the referendum was passed by a 52% - 48% margin (rounded up). From what we can infer about those results (“CEE Event”), the desire for statehood is split down the middle, though the problematic actions of the Trump administration likely had a lot to do with the increased desire for statehood. However, Puerto Rican statehood is not an issue that is understood to be a monolithic since the margin was not very high, though support for it is sufficient to win a referendum.


Puerto Rico is defined by many other things, however. For one thing, it has a special holiday known as "Festival de las Máscaras de Hatillo." Loosely translated this turns into "The Hatillo mask festival." According to the PuertoRico.com blog, this is a holiday related to the religious celebration of when some settlers from the Canary Islands visited. The masks simply represent the Christian martyrs. As such, it is a very religious holiday, representing part of the religious culture that exists in Puerto Rico. How the holiday functions is that the people of Puerto Rico dress up in costumes and masks and take part in traditional music and dances. It's not a very serious occasion, but it does give a subtle illumination on the cultural and religious practices of Puerto Ricans.

One of the most important pieces of legislation to impact the island of Puerto Rico is the Jones Act of 1920. This act was passed during the Woodrow Wilson administration. The act itself does a great number of things, but the most important part of the legislation is that it impoverishes Puerto Rico while enriching the United States shipping industry. According to Yglesias, "For the residents of the island of Puerto Rico, though, the Jones Act is huge. Basic shipments of goods from the island to the US mainland, and vice versa, must be conducted via expensive protected ships rather than exposing them to global competition." While huge American cities on the coasts are rich enough to pay the cost for the economic protectionism, Puerto Rico isn't, and hasn't been because of the lack of economic undernourishment the region has had to put up with. Puerto Rico is forced to receive goods only from American ships, and do so at much higher prices. During the aftermath of hurricane Maria, a waiver was given to Puerto Rico so that they could import needed goods without having to pay the extra price they would by having the goods go through American ships. The history of Puerto Rico cannot be told without delving into the history of how the Jones Act has shaped the history of the territory.

(Credit: stillwaterassociates.com)

Sources:

“CEE Event.” Elecciones2020, elecciones2020.ceepur.org/Escrutinio_General_93/index.html#en/default/PLEBISCITO_Resumen.xml. Accessed 15 Feb. 2021.

PuertoRico.com. “The Vibrant Hatillo Masks Festival.” By PuertoRico.Com, 29 Jan. 2019, www.puertorico.com/blog/the-vibrant-hatillo-masks-festival.

Yglesias, Matthew. “The Jones Act, the Obscure 1920 Shipping Regulation Strangling Puerto Rico, Explained.” Vox, 9 Oct. 2017, www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/9/27/16373484/jones-act-puerto-rico.