194 THE POLITICS OF INTERVENTION"Upon the success with which we build depends, in my
judgement, the avoidance of a more serious military problem
than we have yet encountered in Cuba."
8
The restraints upon the Provisional Government in its
programs were several. While Magoon had ample legal power,
he was mindful that Cuban disapproval of his government
could endanger the peace and American policy. The expecta
tion of the Roosevelt administration was that Magoon respect
the Cuban Constitution and organic law while making accept
able (to both the United States and Cuba) reforms within it.
He had to govern efficiently within his revenues and stabilize
the Cuban electoral system and the political parties. At the
same time Magoon had to adjudicate several important legal
disputes between the Cuban government and some American
contractors and the Catholic church. To put the nation's credit
on a firm basis, all claims against the government arising from
the August Revolution had to be settled and political pris
oners released. In addition, the yellow fever problem needed
more attention. These issues, however tangential to the basic
problems of Cuban political and economic development,
absorbed much of the Provisional Government's energies.^9
Magoon found that administration in the colonial style kept
him rooted to his desk in the national palace. His routine
work load was immense. He had to give the final approval
of the appointments for all political, judicial, and bureaucratic
personnel, including municipal judges, notaries, court clerks,
professors and teachers, and the cleanup crew of the con
gressional offices. He authorized all expenditures, franchises,
concessions, pardons and amnesties, and approved petitions
for private relief. He reviewed and ruled on all judicial deci
sions appealed through the national court system. In his first
year in office he published over a thousand decrees.^10
The Cuban Treasury, a major American concern, weathered
the August Revolution and a series of post-intervention eco
nomic setbacks.^11 An ambitious public works program voted
by the Cuban Congress in 1906 and the August Revolution
turned Estrada Palma's treasury surplus into an estimated
deficit of $4 million. When the government's obligations were