Puerto Rico Herald Champions Cause of Self-Determination Online.SAN JUAN San Juan, city, Argentina San Juan (săn wän, Span. sän hwän), city (1991 pop. 353,476), capital of San Juan prov., W Argentina. It is a commercial and industrial center in an agricultural region. , Puerto Rico--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 2, 1998-- Leading Internet Publication Expands to Bilingual Edition The Puerto Rico Herald, the authoritative "Voice of Puerto Rico Self-Determination," has expanded into a bilingual publication with its latest edition released yesterday, the publisher's announced today. Found online at http://www.puertorico-herald.org, the Herald is a critical, comprehensive and up-to-date resource on Puerto Rico politics, economics, the status debate and current events offering the most timely and inclusive coverage of issues related to the American island territory's current and future political status. Traffic to www.puertorico-herald.org has been constant and feedback positive, according to Herald contacts who pointed out that the site is receiving over 10,000 hits a week. The electronic publication's decision to go bilingual is based on the intent to reach as wide an audience as possible interested in this critical issue; The self-determination decision at hand for Puerto Rico --whether to remain a territorial commonwealth, to seek independence, or to begin a process leading to U.S. statehood state·hood n. The status of being a state, especially of the United States, rather than being a territory or dependency. . Puerto Rico's right to self-determination is overwhelmingly supported by Hispanic organizations nationwide, scores of whom have allied together as the "Hispanic Coalition for Puerto Rican Self-Determination". Members of the Coalition include such influential organizations as the League of United Latin American Citizens The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) is the oldest organization of Hispanic Americans in the United States. With a membership of approximately 115,000, the organization uses education and advocacy to improve living conditions and seek advances for all Hispanic nationality , the Republican National Hispanic Assembly The Republican National Hispanic Assembly is an American political organization which seeks to promote Hispanic issues and interests within the Republican Party, and the party's interests and candidates within the Hispanic population. , the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Hispanic Publications, the Hispanic National Bar Association The Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA) is a non-profit, nation-wide association representing Hispanic persons in the legal profession — attorneys, judges, law educators and law students — in the United States, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, District of Columbia, , and others. According to Coalition contact Selena Walsh, the self-determination issue "is of critical importance to the overwhelming majority of the 30 million Hispanic citizens of the United States -- the fastest growing voting bloc in the country." The Coalition recently held a press conference in Washington, DC to demand action on the Puerto Rico referendum legislation pending before Congress. The 3.8 million U.S. citizens of Puerto Rico will vote on the status option they prefer -- statehood, independence, free association or the territorial status quo [Latin, The existing state of things at any given date.] Status quo ante bellum means the state of things before the war. The status quo to be preserved by a preliminary injunction is the last actual, peaceable, uncontested status which preceded the pending controversy. -- in a plebiscite plebiscite (plĕb`ĭsīt) [Lat.,=popular decree], vote of the people on a question submitted to them, as in a referendum. The term, however, has acquired the more specific meaning of a popular vote concerning changes of sovereignty, as on December 13, 1998. Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens. They have served in the U.S. armed forces since WW I, but have no vote for the president who sends them into battle nor do they have voting representation in Congress. They receive limited federal benefits but do not pay federal income taxes. The island was ceded to the United States by Spain in 1898 at the end of the Spanish-American War Spanish-American War, 1898, brief conflict between Spain and the United States arising out of Spanish policies in Cuba. It was, to a large degree, brought about by the efforts of U.S. expansionists. . |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion