Platt Amendment

On March 2, 1901, the Platt Amendment passed which amended the 1901 Army Appropriations Bill. It stipulated seven conditions for the withdrawal of United States troops remaining in Cuba at the end of the Spanish-American War. It defined the terms of Cuban-U.S. relations to essentially be an unequal one of U.S. dominance over Cuba.

On June 12, 1901, Cuba amended its constitution to contain the text of the Platt Amendment.

On May 22, 1903, Cuba entered into an international treaty with the United States to make the same required seven pledges: the Cuban–American Treaty of Relations. Two of the seven pledges were to allow the United States to intervene unilaterally in Cuban affairs, and a pledge to lease land to the United States for naval bases on the island. (The 1934 Treaty of Relations replaced the 1903 Treaty of Relations, and dropped three of the seven pledges.)

The 1903 Treaty of Relations was used as justification for the Second Occupation of Cuba from 1906 to 1909. On September 29, 1906, Secretary of War (and future U.S. president) William Howard Taft initiated the Second Occupation of Cuba when he established the Provisional Government of Cuba under the terms of the treaty (Article three), declaring himself Provisional Governor of Cuba. On October 23, 1906, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 518, ratifying the order.

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