[Enclosure—Translation]
The President of Nicaragua (Moncada) to the Secretary of State
Managua, Enero 22 de
1932.
Dear Mr. Stimson: Before anything else, in answer to
your last kind letter, let me say that I regret that I did not speak
clearly to Mr. Hanna, or that
he did not understand me, when I talked with him about the reform of
the Nicaraguan Constitution, and gave him the memorandum you know
of.
From boyhood I have always respected the rights of others and since
my rise to the Presidency I have affirmed both orally and in writing
that the Nicaraguan people gave me their votes for four years, which
period ends December 31st of the present year.
All my life I have kept my word and I shall do so in the case of the
promise I gave to the Conservative candidate Benard, in the letter which you are
kind enough to recall to me,4
translated into English. Mr. Hanna himself has heard these words on various
occasions; and for that reason, because I had no thought of
extending my term, I said nothing of this to you, either in the
memorandum referred to or in my letter of October 14, 1931.5
But I did indeed say to Mr. Hanna, in taking leave of him, that Nicaragua is a
poor country, that cannot afford elections every four [Page 768] years; that a reform of
our Constitution to prolong the presidential term to six years or
more, if possible, is necessary; but these words did not at all
embrace the idea of my own continuation in office; but that my
successor should enjoy a longer term in virtue of a reform in the
Constitution.
On the other hand, I sent you the arguments in favor of the case. I
have always believed that the present Constitution is a dead letter;
I do not feel convinced to the contrary by the arguments you
present; but I do admit that a discussion of this point is not as
essential as other matters of greater importance and gravity for my
country.
I come to the point: If you will be kind enough to reread my letter
to Mr. Benard and recall some
of my statements in Tipitapa,6 you will
remember that I spoke then to you of the necessity of supervision
for more than two election periods in order to accustom the people
to honest and free elections. I said the same in the last part of
the first paragraph of my letter of October last, of which I have
made mention.
I did not reckon, and I do not think you did either, on the change of
public opinion in the United States; and did not think that, in
1933, we would be forgotten by the hand of God and exposed once
more, by the abandonment of this policy, to civil war, which from
the time of our independence to the present, has cost us so many
tears, so much loss of life, property and honor. Civil war has
created our bandits. They are adventurers from other countries and
people accustomed to not working and to living off the property of
others.
Furthermore, could you assure me that opinion in the United States
will not change again and that, in the case of a civil war, there
would not be another intervention?
If the marines go away, why not look for a middle course that would
allow us to live in peace and would be a justification, for you and
me, of our agreement in Tipitapa, when you solemnly declared that
that date—May fourth—marked an era of peace for Nicaragua?
I have always been candid. I have always said that neither
Conservatives nor Liberals, by themselves, would give us free
elections. If I have gone to war, which I so much detest, for any
reason it was to secure liberty of suffrage. It was my one urgent
demand at Tipitapa and it came from the bottom of my heart.
When you told me, in one of your letters, that the marines would
withdraw in 1933, I thought with sorrow of all the blood that had
been shed, from the Rio Grande to Managua, and that, after my
administration, would again flow over our fields and cities, because
the hatred and passions of our two parties has not disappeared.
[Page 769]
For these reasons and fears I conceived the idea of the reform of the
Constitution so that the two historic parties could live together in
peace on a basis of proportional minority representation, secured by
the Statutes of the Liberal Party.
The idea was accepted most willingly by the principal men of the
Conservative party on the 17th of the present month, and public
opinion continues favorable to it.
We could make arrangements similar to those of the Dawson Agreements of 1910,7
which provided for a Constituent Assembly and a Constitution.
But the arrangements should this time, in my opinion, tend towards a
constitutional reform so that minority representation in all public
offices of popular election be established, as I have said above, in
the Fundamental Charter. This is a principle of representative
republican government, which would allow the losing party to get
along with the winning one and would promote harmony in the
Republic.
If the signature of a Delegate from the Department of State be added
to the agreements as mediator, it would be the means for the parties
of beginning the new era of which you spoke in the present Villa
Stimson, because our
parties are so weak that they need a prudent hand to help in the
development of the Republic, and because the mediation of the
American Legation in each Presidential election would be sufficient
to guarantee the observance of these agreements and of the
Constitution.
My reasons are fundamental. The United States cannot abandon the
Monroe Doctrine.8 If
there is civil war, there will be intervention again and the
difficulties and struggles of the United States and Nicaragua with
world opinion will reappear.
I trust, my dear friend, that you will never regret having expressed
the hope that I would not forget my word. I desire most strongly
that the marines supervise the election of representatives of the
Constituent Assembly and therefore I received Admiral Woodward with most
cordial goodwill and requested his appointment by the Supreme Court,
and I am now taking the first steps to further his task.
With nothing more for the present, I beg to remain,
Very truly yours,