817.00/5294: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Chargé in Nicaragua (Munro)
24. With the substitute project before us, as given in Section 2 of your 36, we are now able to see more clearly the aims and purposes of the opposition. They are making their fight against the law nominally on constitutional grounds which, even in ordinary circumstances, would not be regarded as tenable. In reality they are endeavoring to scrap the Tipitapa Agreement by attacking it in its most vital feature. The substitute project is plainly intended to eliminate genuine American supervision, and throw the whole business back into the old way of doing things, with partisan control of the election machinery for all practical purposes, and partisan judgment of the result. It is easy to see that the Conservative majority in the Chamber of Deputies intends if it can to make a mockery of this election by reserving the right to deal with it in the same way that the recent departmental election in Esteli was handled. The very essence of the arrangement which Colonel Stimson made, and which was embodied in a solemn agreement by the Presidents of the two countries, was that this time at least the old system should be set aside. It was stipulated that the United States should have full control to see that every qualified voter in Nicaragua should have an opportunity to cast his ballot free from all intimidation, and to have his ballot honestly counted. A fair election means a free vote and an honest count, and it also means a declaration and recognition of the result in accordance with such count. That is what it meant to the men who laid down their arms at Tipitapa [Page 445] and that is what it means to us now. Anything short of this would be an unthinkable and intolerable breach of faith. Everybody concerned agreed to have such an honest election and to abide by the result. Under these conditions no party in Nicaragua which undertakes to convert the election into anything different from what it was clearly intended to be and succeeds in setting up a Government as the result of such tactics, can expect that government to be afterwards recognized by the United States. The Congress of Nicaragua may have the power under the Constitution to do what it did in the Esteli case. We are not disposed to argue about the powers of Congress, but we are bound to say that the exercise of such power, if it exists, so as to impair effective supervision in accordance with the Agreement, or to change the count and set aside the result after its fairness had been determined and certified by the American supervising authority, would inevitably create a situation where it would be impossible for the United States to recognize the Government established by these methods. The United States obviously could not, after having undertaken to supervise a fair election and having done so, stultify itself by extending recognition to a Government established in disregard of the result to which it had certified.
Unless you see some good reason for not doing so, the Department thinks you should read the foregoing to President Diaz, and it seems to us even more important for you to read it to Chamorro. It would be well for you to be accompanied by General McCoy, especially in your interview with Chamorro. In both of these interviews you should also make plain that the foregoing statement must not be taken as in any way modifying our main position that the duties and obligations imposed by the Tipitapa Agreement must be fulfilled, and that the United States fully intends to carry them out so far as it is concerned. The above statement by pointing out the inevitable consequences of a different course explains precisely why we must and shall go ahead with what we have set out to do. There can be no weakening on that proposition.