THE UNITED STATES AND THE WEST INDIES.

Westport Times, Volume II, Issue 271, 13 June 1868, Page 2

THE UNITED STATES AND THE WEST INDIES.

The Press of Jamaica does not relish the idea of the United States acquiring territory among the "West India Islands. The Kingston Journal thus remarks on the subject. The purchase of St. Thomas and St. John by the United States Grovernment, following so soon after acquisition of the Bay of Samana by the same power, has been regarded, and justly, with a feeling of alarm in most of the AVest India Islands, whose inhabitants clearly perceive, if they had not the open avowal of President Johnston, that the ultimate absorbtion of countries is the settled policy of the United States Government. It would appear from accounts furnished the American papers that this feeling of alarm is as intense in Santo Domingo as anywhere else. A letter from the Republic apprizes us that " the question continues toagitate the public mind, ar.ti that the public discussion of it does net lessen the feeling of opposition which the action of Cabral in the matter awakened." It formed the subject of a lengthy debate in the National Congress, and the speech of Sen or Zefra, an able legislator and one of the most eminent men of Santo Domingo had considerably stirred the minds of his countrymen. He discussed the question from a threefold point of view : First, as a political question ; secondly, as an economical question; and thirdly, as a social question. Under the first head, he maintained that the proposed transfer of Samana is opposed to the fundamental principles -of the Dominican Constitution, and to the laws of Santo Domingo ; and that, to introduce into their Republic a foreign power of such immense strength as the United States, would be to attack the independence of Santo Domingo, and to put their nationality in peril. "To pull down the Dominican flag," he said, " in order to plant a foreign flag in its place, is not only repugnant, but odious, and whatever may be the motives, such an

act could not bo regarded otherwise than as an act of treason."