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Puerto Rico Territory

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Why do so many people argue about how Puerto Rico became a territory? Several historians believe that Puerto Rico was made a US Territory by The Foraker Act of 1900. Other historians say that The Jones-Shafroth Act of 1917 made it a US Territory. Some might also say it was World War I. This essay will tell you about, Puerto Rico, all three things, and also which one is truly correct. Before starting to truly explain things, let me explain how this whole thing started.
At the beginning is how Puerto Rico was discovered. Puerto Rico was found by Christopher Columbus on his second voyage to the Americas, when he was trying to find his fort on Hispaniola called La Navidad which was destroyed. Then Juan Ponce de Léon stumbled across Puerto Rico again while on his search to find the mystical “Fountain of Youth”. Then for the next three hundred years, Spain will rule Puerto Rico with an iron fist until 1898 when the Spanish-American War broke out and the USA got Puerto Rico for themselves. The Spanish-American War was a three month war that started on April 25, 1898 and ended on August 12, 1898. The war was started when the USS Maine blew up on February 15, 1898 by a supposed underwater mine. The Americans blamed the Spanish even though there is no evidence leading to that the USS Maine was blown up by an underwater mine. If there were …show more content…

The Puerto Ricans could still not elect their own governor but now the got their own Puerto Rican House of Representatives would now have 39 representatives and 19 senators.It also gave Puerto Ricans a bill of rights and allowed the people elect the Resident Commissioner instead of the President choosing. But on the downside, the actual Puerto Rican citizenship started decreasing, the reason why is because as the US citizenship started increasing, the Puerto Rican citizenship started

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