William R. Shepherd

“ The Congress at Bogota drafted a constitution, providing for a separate republic to bear the old Spanish name of "New Granada," accepted definitely the resignation of Bolivar, and granted him a pension. Venezuela, his native land, set up a congress of its own and demanded that he be exiled. The division of Quito declared itself independent, under the name of the "Republic of the Equator" (Ecuador) . Everywhere the artificial handiwork of the Liberator lay in ruins. "America is ungovernable. Those who have served in the revolution have ploughed the sea," was his despairing cry. ”

“ Jealous not only of his personal prestige but of what he imagined, or pretended to imagine, were the rights of a small nation, Castro tried throughout to portray the situation in such a light as to induce the other Hispanic republics also to view foreign interference as a dire peril to their own independence and sovereignty; and he further endeavored to involve the United States in a struggle with European powers as a means possibly of testing the efficacy of the Monroe Doctrine or of laying bare before the world the evil nature of American imperialistic designs. ”

“ It was while the United States was thus widening the sphere of its influence in the Caribbean that the "A B C" powers—Argentina, Brazil, and Chile—reached an understanding which was in a sense a measure of self-defense. For some years cordial relations had existed among these three nations which had grown so remarkably in strength and prestige. It was felt that by united action they might set up in the New World the European principle of a balance of power, assume the leadership in Hispanic America, and serve in some degree as a counterpoise to the United States. ”

“ In an atmosphere of political theorizing mingled with ambition for personal advancement, both leaders and followers were professed devotees of constitutions. No people, it was thought, could maintain a real republic and be a true democracy if they did not possess a written constitution. The longer this was, the more precise its definition of powers and liberties, the more authentic the republic and the more genuine the democracy was thought to be. ”

“ At the time of the American Revolution most of the New World still belonged to Spain and Portugal, whose captains and conquerors had been the first to come to its shores. Spain had the lion's share, but Portugal held Brazil, in itself a vast land of unsuspected resources. No empire mankind had ever yet known rivaled in size the illimitable domains of Spain and Portugal in the New World ”

“ As the foreign pressure on Castro steadily increased, Luis Maria Drago, the Argentine Minister of Foreign Affairs, formulated in 1902 the doctrine with which his name has been associated. It stated in substance that force should never be employed between nations for the collection of contractual debts. Encouraged by this apparent token of support from a sister republic, Castro defied his array of foreign adversaries more vigorously than ever, declaring that he might find it needful to invade the United States, by way of New Orleans, to teach it the lesson it deserved! ”

“ Ever a zealous advocate of large states, Bolivar was an equally ardent partisan of confederation. As president of three republics—of Colombia actually, and of its satellites, Peru and Bolivia, through his lieutenants—he could afford now to carry out the plan that he had long since cherished of assembling at the town of Panama, on Colombian soil, an "august congress" representative of the independent countries of America. Here, on the isthmus created by nature to join the continents, the nations created by men should foregather and proclaim fraternal accord. ”

“ On their part, the Hispanic Americans have come to a clearer consciousness of the fact that on the continents of the New World there are two distinct types of civilization, with all that each connotes of differences in race, psychology, tradition, language, and custom—their own, and that represented by the United States. Appreciative though the southern countries are of their northern neighbor, they cling nevertheless to their heritage from Spain and Portugal in whatever seems conducive to the maintenance of their own ideals of life and thought. ”

“ A century and more had now passed since the Spanish and Portuguese peoples of the New World had achieved their independence. Eighteen political children of various sizes and stages of advancement, or backwardness, were born of Spain in America, and one acknowledged the maternity of Portugal. Big Brazil has always maintained the happiest relations with the little mother in Europe, who still watches with pride the growth of her strapping youngster. ”

“ Since Peru and Bolivia together had a population double that of Chile, and since Peru possessed a much larger army and navy than Chile, the allies counted confidently on victory. But Peru's army of eight thousand—having within four hundred as many officers as men, directed by no fewer than twenty-six generals, and presided over by a civil government altogether inept—was no match for an army less than a third of its size to be sure, but well drilled and commanded, and with a stable, progressive, and efficient government at its back. ”

“ Their opponents, the Liberals, dominated by men of radical tendencies, were eager to assert the right, to which they thought Cuba entitled as an independent sovereign nation, to make possible mistakes and correct them without having the United States forever holding the ferule of the schoolmaster over it. They were well aware, however, that they were not at liberty to have their country pass through the tempestuous experience which had been the lot of so many Hispanic republics. They could vent a natural anger and disappointment, nevertheless, on the President and his supporters. ”

“ Now that the bond of unity once supplied by Spain had been broken, the entire region which had been its continental domain in America dissolved awhile into its elements. The Spanish language, the traditions and customs of the dominant class, and a "republican" form of government, were practically the sole ties which remained. Laws, to be sure, had been enacted, providing for the immediate or gradual abolition of negro slavery and for an improvement in the status of the Indian and half-caste; but the bulk of the inhabitants, as in colonial times, remained outside of the body politic and social. ”

“ No characters in Spanish American history have called forth so much controversy about their respective merits and demerits as these two heroes of independence—Bolivar and San Martin. Even now it seems quite impossible to obtain from the admirers of either an opinion that does full justice to both; and foreigners who venture to pass judgment are almost certain to provoke criticism from one set of partisans or the other. Both Bolivar and San Martin were sons of country gentlemen, aristocratic by lineage and devoted to the cause of independence. ”

“ The struggle which broke out among Guatemala, Salvador, and Honduras, lasted until 1829, when Francisco Morazan, at the head of the "Allied Army, Upholder of the Law," entered the capital of the republic and assumed dictatorial power.
Of all the Hispanic nations, however, Brazil was easily the most stable. Here the leaders, while clinging to independence, strove to avoid dangerous innovations in government. Rather than create a political system for which the country was not prepared, they established a constitutional monarchy. ”

“ When the La Plata Congress at Tucuman took the decisive action that severed the bond with Spain, it uttered a prophecy for all Spanish America. To quote its language: "Vast and fertile regions, climates benign and varied, abundant means of subsistence, treasures of gold and silver... and fine productions of every sort will attract to our continent innumerable thousands of immigrants, to whom we shall open a safe place of refuge and extend a beneficent protection." ”

“ He knew, of course, that the Mexican constitution made impossible demands upon the political capacity of the people. He was himself mainly of Indian blood and he believed that he understood the temperament and limitations of most Mexicans. Knowing how tenaciously they clung to political notions, he believed that it was safer and wiser to forego, at least for a time, real popular government and to concentrate power in the hands of a strong man who could maintain order. ”

“ Considering the disparity in strength, wealth, and prestige between the northern country and its southern fellows, suggestions of the sort could be made practicable only by letting the United States do whatever it might think needful to accomplish the objects which it sought. Obviously the Hispanic nations, singly or collectively, would hardly venture to take any such action within the borders of the United States itself, if, for example, it failed to maintain what, in their opinion, was "a republican form of government." ”

“ Since attempts of the Hispanic countries themselves to realize the aims of Bolivar in calling the Congress at Panama had failed, the United States now undertook to call into existence a sort of inter-American Congress. Instead of being merely a supporter, the great republic of the north had resolved to become the director of the movement for greater solidarity in thought and action. ”

“ Disturbed conditions bred by twenty years of warfare, antique methods of industry, a backward commerce, inadequate means of communication, and a population ignorant, superstitious, and scant, made a strong ruler more or less indispensable. Whatever his official designation, the dictator was the logical successor of the Spanish viceroy or captain general, but without the sense of responsibility or the legal restraint of either. These circumstances account for that curious political phase in the development of the Spanish American nations—the presidential despotism. ”

“ The European powers had displayed an apparent willingness to have the United States, if it chose to do so, assume the role of a New World policeman and financial guarantor. Were it to assume these duties, backward republics in the Caribbean and its vicinity were likely to have their affairs, internal as well as external, supervised by the big nation in order to ward off European intervention. At this moment, indeed, the United States was intervening in Panama. The prospect aroused in many Hispanic countries the fear of a "Yankee peril" greater even than that emanating from Europe. ”