At once, as if by an electric flash, the sympathy of the American people was enlisted with the Insurgents who were (as the Americans believed) fighting Spain for their _liberty_.

Public opinion was on the Insurgents' side and against Spain from the beginning.

This feeling of sympathy for the fighting Cubans knew no North nor South; and strange as it may seem the Southerner who quails before the mob spirit that disfranchises, ostracises and lynches an American Negro who seeks his liberty at home, became a loud champion of the Insurgent cause in Cuba, which was, in fact, the cause of Cuban Negroes and mulattoes.
GENERAL FITZHUGH LEE, of Virginia, possibly the most noted Southerner of the day, was sent by President Cleveland to Havana as Consul General, and seemed proud of the honor of representing his government there, judging from his reports of the Insurgents, which were favorable.

General Lee was retained at his post by President McKinley until it became necessary to recall him, thus having the high honor paid him of not being changed by the new McKinley administration, which differed from him in politics; and as evidence of General Fitzhugh Lee's sympathy with the Cubans it may be cited that he sent word to the Spanish Commander (Blanco) on leaving Havana that he would return to the island again and when he came he "would bring the stars and stripes in front of him." BELLIGERENT RIGHTS TO THE INSURGENTS OR NEUTRALITY became the topic of discussion during the close of President Cleveland's administration.
The President took the ground that the Insurgents though deserving of proper sympathy, and such aid for humanity's sake as could be given them, yet they had not established on any part of the island such a form of government as could be recognized at Washington, and accorded belligerent rights or rights of a nation at war with another nation; that the laws of neutrality should be strictly enforced, and America should keep "hands off" and let Spain and the Insurgents settle their own differences.
[Illustration: GENERAL FITZHUGH LEE.] MUCH MONEY AND TIME was expended by the United States government in maintaining this neutral position.

Fillibustering expeditions were constantly being fitted up in America with arms and ammunition for the Cuban patriots.