Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-02-18
Mr.. BLA1sEs MEXICAN BLunDsR.

A dispatch received yesterday furnishes
a sufficiently telling commentary upon MIR.
Blaine's letter to the Mexican Government
concerning the Guatemala question. The
| dispatch is as follows ''Notice has been
"received at the Mexican and other lega.
" tions at Washington that on the l4th of
january Guatemala offered treaty to
"Mexico, which will be accepted, freely
"ceding to Mexico the section of country
"about which there has been boundary
"dispute, and agreeing to establish the
boundary according to the claims of
Mexico. This is rather comical ending
"to Blaine's proposed intervention in favor
"of Guatemala, which he sought to justify
con grounds which the Mexican Secretary
"of State showed him to be untenable,
for the reason that Blaine had omitted to
''inform himself of the history Of the
facts of the dispute" Blaine's head
long diplomacy was exhibited in this case
quite as strikingly as in his dispatches
ON the Clay ton Bulwer treaty. With
characteristic confidence he undertook to
teach Mexican history to Mexico. He
informed the doubtless astonished Mexican
Secretary of State that Mexico had acquired
possession of the territory which was in
dispute, by force, and that it had originally
belonged to Guatemala, whose moral right
to it was the stronger. He charged Mexico
with Choking with contempt upon the
boundaries which should separate her
from weaker neighbors, and assured her
of the danger of can appeal to force to
make good her rights upon territory in
dispute without the clear justification of
"a legitimate title to it. The Mexican
Secretary replied to all this by observing
that Mr.. Blaine did not appear to have in
formed himself sufficiently upon the merits
of the case in dispute that Mexico had
not made any aggressions upon Guatemala;
that the disputed territory had not been
acquired by her by force of arms, but had
always belonged to her; that Guatemala
had been the aggressor, and that under the
circumstances Mexico could not consent to
abandon her claims to her own territory,
for no better reason than because an Ameri.
can Secretary of State failed to understand
the situation.
OF course the Mexican answer was not
couched in as plain terms as these, but
we have given the general tone of the re-
ply. And now Guatemala has admitted
the justice of the Mexican claim, and
agreed to relinquish her demand upon the
disputed territory, in manner which con-
clusively demonstrates the true inwardness
of her former movements. 1t is unfortu-
nately only too clear that the Guatemala |
having been advised of |
MIR. Blaine's incompetence, determined to |
make use OF him in order to get the bet
ter of Mexico. Calculating that the |
weight of the United States when thrown |
into the scale would bear it down, the
Minister at Washington was
to make as piteous an appeal to
Mr.. Blaine as he could devise, and our
and impulsive ex-Secretary EVIL
IDENTIFY fell into the trap at once. The
Guatemslan Minister must have had very
great confidence in Blaine's rasbness
to misrepresent the case to him go
boldly. but the event proved that he knew
his man. Blaine never paused to obtain
the other side of the case, but proceeded
to dash off his extraordinary dispatch to
Minister Morgan at the City of Mexico,
and as we have seen, leetured the Mexican
Government roundly. The Guatemalan
Minister, however, had reckoned without
ais host. 1t had not occurred to him or
lis Government that Mexico would be
5ery unlikely to yield when it was SO per-
ectly apparent that the proposition of the
American Government rested upon total
Of the facts
No doubt Guatemala thought that the
troke was mastery one, but it proved
failure. The Mexican Government merely
pointed out Mr.. Blaiue's error, and held
irm to its demands, and when, shortly af-
erwards, Mr.. Blaine went ont OF Office,
Guatemala realized that it would be i'm
ossible to carry on the game with the {
ew Secretary of State, and SO prepared to {
ield as gracefully as possible. This cpl
ode shows how much mischief man like 8
Elaine can do, however Had he remained /,