The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1854-12-13

spoken. Inc Aatter may DC tIIeuy ucoCIioVu
as disorderly hsdy Of individuals, who meet
to chat with one anot e. who XIV nothing
and care less for the business they transact;
and who are capsbe OF passing dozen ordi-
n ices without unders' auding one, in half an
hour. will be seen from this that the pros
pect of right judgment in this matter depends
mainly ON judicious exercise Of outside pres
sure.
Proclamation OF Monai chy In GuatenAala-
Intxigues on Santa Annas
In the general interest created by the course
OF events in Earope the public mind has been
diverted from what is occurring nearer home,
and wnich, under otter circumstances, could not
fail to arrest lurse share o; attention We
have lad frequent occasion to point out and
reprobate the course Of affairs in Mexico under
the malign infuen es hich have brought it
to the very brink of irretrievable ruin. The
Quixotc Dictator Of that unhappy country, in
his insane ambition TO- reg.l power, has not
only broken down the few remaining bulwarks
of liberty, but in serv.le imitation OF the ex-
pertinent in France, which was mainly success
full from its novelty, has instituted the solemn
mummery of an appeal TO the people, having
for its object the immediate installation OF i'm
perial power. He would raise an impotent
sceptre over paralyzed industry, national
bankruptcy, universal discomfort, and success
tul revolution. But no possible capacity Of
Spanish byperbole can impose the result
upon the world as the voice Of God. Under
the operation Of the machinery now at work.
this appeal will appear to meet an unanimous
response; but it is questionable whether, even
then, it will be available to postpone, for sin
gle hour, the doom which 8 settling dark aud
ominous, not only upon Mexico, but every
remnant of Spanish power in North America
For, while Mexico presents this melancholy
spectacle of an entire abandonment of even the
form of republicanism, we find her unworthy
example simultaneously followed by the princi-
pal State of the old federation Of Central
America, the so-called Republic of Guatemala
Our latest advices from the capital of that
State convey the intelligence hat after several
years Of practical Dictatorship, under the de-
nomination Of President, the Chief Carrera
has been proclaimed Perpetual p esident, with
the right Of naming his successor; and that
in short, discarding all verbal DISCUSSES
Guatemala has been resolved iuto q
monarchy, with hereditary succession in
the line of Carrera, the de tact0 monarch
Before this time the act has been consummated
with whatever Of pomp and ceremony the An
cient capital of Guatemala is capable Of lending
to the occasion. This formality alone was want
ing to complete the absolute annihilation of the
republic, and her unnatural return to the tradi-
tons and practices OF system which the world
supposed had been banished forever from the
soil Of North America.
The announcement OF this event in the official
gazette was appropriately coupled with lead
ing article denying what it contemptuoasly
styled "the sovereignty of intelligence" a.
the source of power, and repIete with those
puerile sophisms upon which the advocates Of
oligarchS and monarchy rely to support their
sy stems of government. The tenor Of this arti-
lie viii sufficiently appear from the following
extract:-
The declaration of the exercise of perpetual an
'hoJity in the Republic q! by General Carrera is
fact Onsummated. Neitaer the corporations who
have wrought TINS charge, nor the object of thi-
power 10 revoke IT, nor TO make that not to be.
which actually is Resistance will entrench it,elf
behind considerations more or less frank more
lees reasonable. All the imp ortant reforms which
Rave bsen made in this country during fifteen years,
have been met BY this same veto Of the sectaries Of
" the sovereignty of intelligence" Yet every thing
good has been carried in spite Of them, and that
pretensiups, but wenintentioned and decidtC. The
country has reaped the fruit OF these reforms, md
posterlty will emphatcally condemn both the pro
tests and professors.
The significance Of this paragraph viii be
more apparent when We mention that the
change has been effected against the opposition
Of nearly all the educated men Of the State,
whose protests were utterly disregarded by
Carrera and the oligarchists and priests who are
his adbelents and advisers. Carrera himself, it
will be remembered, il an Indian, and twenty
years ago was an illiterate pig driver. He
arose to notoriety in the war Of castles which
desolated Guatemala in 1887, and which was
melted by tie priests, who persuaded the In
dams that the cholera, which prevailed in that
year, had been caused by the government of
the republic and the foreigners, who, they al.
legged, had poisoned the waters. This hostility
Of the priests arose from the suppression Of the
conve, ts and abolition of tithes by the govern
ment..
When Carrera entered Guatemala at the
head Of his Iudian hordes, his banner bore q
deaths head and crossbones, and was inscribed
death to Whites, Liberals and Foreigners p
He was immediately taken up by the priests
and soi-disant aristocracy 6f the capita, the
debris OF the old vice-Regal court, who sue,
cessfully used his power and influence to sweep