Following the government police massacre of Nationalist protesters at the University of Puerto Rico in Río Piedras in 1935 ( the Río Piedras massacre ) and again at Ponce in 1937 , the US Senator Millard Tydings from Maryland supported a bill in 1936 to give independence to Puerto Rico . ( He had co-sponsored the Tydings – McDuffie Act , which provided independence to the Philippines after a 10-year transition under a limited autonomy . ) All the Puerto Rican parties supported the bill , but Muñoz Marín opposed it . Tydings did not gain passage of the bill
Río Piedras massacre
Río Piedras massacre
Luis Muñoz Marín