Selected Speeches of Pedro Albizu Campos

Pedro Albizu Campos (1891-1965), president of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, was the most influential independence leader of the 20th century. His speeches — delivered in both Spanish and English, drawing on his Harvard legal education and deep knowledge of international law — constitute the most sustained and sophisticated critique of American colonialism produced by a colonial subject.

On Colonial Status (1936):
"Puerto Rico is a nation. It has been a nation for over four centuries. The United States invaded Puerto Rico in 1898 under the pretext of liberating it from Spain. Instead, the United States imposed upon Puerto Rico a colonial regime more absolute than the one Spain had maintained."

On the Insular Cases:
"The Supreme Court of the United States has decided that Puerto Rico belongs to but is not a part of the United States. This is the definition of colonialism: to belong to but not be part of. To be owned but not included. To be governed but not represented."

On U.S. Citizenship (1917):
"They gave us citizenship not to make us Americans but to make us soldiers. They gave us citizenship so they could draft our sons into their wars. What kind of citizenship is this that comes with obligations but without rights, with duties but without representation?"

On the Right to Revolution:
"The right of a people to rebel against colonial domination is recognized by international law, by the Declaration of Independence of the United States, and by the moral conscience of humanity. If the people of Puerto Rico take up arms against colonial rule, they exercise a right that the founders of the United States claimed for themselves in 1776."

On Economic Colonialism:
"They did not come to Puerto Rico to bring democracy. They came for the sugar, the tobacco, the coffee, and the strategic military position. Everything else — the citizenship, the Commonwealth, the elections — is decoration on the cage."

Historical Context:
Albizu Campos was arrested in 1936 for seditious conspiracy and spent most of the period from 1937 to 1964 in prison. He was subjected to what he and his supporters believed was radiation experimentation in prison. He was pardoned by Governor Muñoz Marín in 1953, rearrested after the 1954 Capitol attack (which he did not participate in), and remained imprisoned until 1964. He died on April 21, 1965 — broken in health but unbroken in conviction.

His words remain the most powerful articulation of Puerto Rico's colonial condition — a condition that, six decades after his death, remains fundamentally unchanged.