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whatever fashion) to the very same people, all imaginable forms of corruption crops up at all possible levels, sooner or later. Thus, those in power
are in power in perpetuity, and the situation regresses to one not unlike that of long ago, where
there was “the divine right of kings,” and royalty
had that power by the grace of God.
The name “unit of power” in such societies has
only led to a situation in which one day a man,
just one man, stands in front of an armored tank
column and stops the forward progress (this is
been seen, in practice, and demonstrated in Universal History).
NO free practice of law
If one had to somehow characterize things in
Cuba, we could say it was a country of euphemisms. The names of things are twisted, distorted,
forced; they are made to demonstrate that what is,
isn’t.
Thus, a catastrophic economic situation was
called “the special period”; “a violent eviction of
people from a home, an “extraction”; those who
left the island and went abroad in search of a better life for themselves and their families were
called “scum and traitors”; paying highly qualified people to practice their professions abroad
became a “brain theft”; and so on.
When a cooperative, which worldwide is defined
as owning its own means of production, does not
function this way in Cuba, but is still called a “cooperative,” what we have, once again, is a euphemism.
Yet, squaring a circle has always been complicated; no matter how much you try (even forcefully), it is unlikely, in effect, that anyone will say
the circle has become a square.
Cuba proclaims at all international events and to
all international organisms that the practice of law
is unfettered; internally, though, one must belong
to a collective group to practice it. These are presented as NGOs, but they are really State institutions.
Cuban jurists who live on the island studied at the
very same universities that the lawyers in collective groups did; they graduated the same way and

can be as capable as them. Yet, they cannot practice law BECAUSE THEY DO NOT BELONG
to collective groups. Only those who do can practice law.
One can adduce whatever reasons for this, but
there is only one reality: lawyers not under the
control of one of these collective law firms could
create unfavorable citations and ask uncomfortable questions.
None of the aforesaid goes along at all with the
democratic and legal rhetoric of Cuba’s independence heroes.
They had many positive words of praise about the
U.S.’s achievements, its contributions to individual freedoms and strict adherence to constitutionalism and democratic vocation.
Thus, it is no longer possible to continue ignoring
the influence the U.S. Constitution of 1788 and
Declaration of the 1789 French Revolution’s
Rights of Man and Citizens had on the constitutional thought of our founders in our children’s
history courses, at all levels.
The following examples are enough to make this
clear:
• Letter written by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes,
President of the Republic in Arms, to Mr. Morales
Lemus, Cuba’s Representative to the United
States, dated April 13, 1869.
“Thus, the Republic of Cuba has been constituted
according to the purest democratic principles.
It recognizes the following as inalienable right:
freedom of religion, speech and the press.
There will be no restrictions placed upon the last
two except those pertaining to the extraordinary
circumstances we are currently living.”
• Guáimaro Constitution (1869), Article 28
“The House cannot attack freedom of religion,
press, peaceful assembly, education and petition
nor any of the people’s unalienable rights.”
Today, when the absolute failure of Marxist-Leninist ideology at all levels is more than evident,

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