Puerti Rico: Political Pamphlets

Articles, factsheets, conference documents, pamphlets, bulletins, programs, reports and histories issued by American Friends Service Committee, Asociacin Cubana de las Naciones Unidas, Caribbean Labour Solidarity, Committee for Puerto Rican Decolonization, Committee for Puerto Rican Independence, Conferecia Internacional de Solaridad con la Independencia de Puerto Rico, Liga Socialista Puertorriquea, Movimiento de Izquierda Nacional Puertorriqueo, Movimiento de Liberacin Nacional (P.R.), Movimiento Ecumenico Nacional de Puerto Rico, New Movement in Solidarity with Puerto Rican Independence and Socialism, Partido Independentista Puertorriqueo, Partido Socialista Puertorriquea, Russell Tribunal on Repression in Brazil, Chile, and Latin America, United Nations Comit de Puerto Rico, and United States Dept. of State.

Puerto Rico has been dominated by the United States since its seizure from Spain in 1898. Its ambiguous status, resolved first by making it an unincorporated territory of the United States in 1917 and then by according it Commonwealth status in 1952, persists to this day. Puerto Ricans are citizens of the United States, serve in its armed forces and yet cannot vote in Presidential elections. Unsurprisingly constitutional issues feature prominently in the materials held here, with both pro-independence groups on the island and in the United States represented as well as the United Nations Commission on De-Colonization. However, there is a lack of material from those parties which have successfully won referenda to maintain the island's current status, as well as from those who campaign for Puerto Rico to become the 51st state, and probably a disproportionate quantity from the anti-American left.

Randomly within boxes (at present)

Open to all for research purposes; access is free for anyone in higher education.

Description compiled by Daniel Millum, Political Archives Project Officer at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies and the Institute for the Study of the Americas

Records at item level on library catalogue (SASCAT)

Copies can usually be obtained - apply to library staff.

The majority of the materials held in the political archives of the Library of the Institute for the Study of the Americas (ISA) originate from the Contemporary Archive on Latin America (CALA), a documentation and research centre on Latin America which donated its holdings to the Institute of Latin American Studies (ILAS) upon its closure in 1981. In 2004 ILAS merged with the Institute of United States Studies (IUSS) to form ISA, which inherited the political archives. The core collection has continued since 1981 to be supplemented by further donations and by materials acquired through the visits of Institute staff and their contacts to the relevant countries.

Further accruals are expected

See also Political Pamphlet material for other countries in the region, as well as related material in the library's main classified sequence, all held in the ISA library.