AUTHOR’S PREFACE
By many persons in the United States, Central America is conceived of chiefly as a land of revolutions, bankrupt governments, and absconding presidents, and a haven for fugitives from justice from more settled countries. The progress of the people of the Isthmus since their declaration of independence, and the significance of this progress in view of the difficulties with which they have had to contend, are rarely recognized. The fact is too frequently overlooked that the greater part of the people of the five republics, except in Costa Rica, are descendants of the semi-civilized aboriginal tribes whom the Conquistadores enslaved in the sixteenth century, and that these Indians still remain, for the most part, in a condition of dense ignorance and economic dependence. Even the white upper classes were prevented for three centuries from making any advance in civilization by the restriction of intercourse with other countries and the centralization of authority in the hands of foreign officials under the Spanish colonial system; and they were unable to set up a stable political system when they obtained their independence, because of their lack of experience in self-government, and because of the absence of political institutions upon which a stable system of government could be based.
When we take these facts into consideration, and when we see the advances which some of the Central American Republics have been able to make despite these handicaps, we shall be less ready to conclude that their people are inherently unfit for self-government. Our own race is removed from the disorderly conditions which characterize the more turbulent parts of the Isthmus only by a few hundred years, and in the United States we are not unfamiliar today with evils similar to some of the worst evils of Central American political life. There is no reason to suppose that all of the five republics will not eventually develop stable governments, as some of them have already done. Although conditions in many parts of the Isthmus are still very bad, they are gradually being overcome by the efforts of the better elements among the ruling classes and by the gradual progress of the common people. Since the Washington Conference of 1907, moreover, the preservation of internal and international peace in the Isthmus has been powerfully aided by the influence of the United States.
That the economic and political conditions of Central America and the other countries of the Caribbean should be understood by the American government and the American people is of the utmost importance. The policy of the United States, more perhaps than any other factor either external or internal, will determine the course of the development of the five republics during the next few decades, and if this policy is to be beneficial, it must be based on knowledge and must be controlled by an intelligent public opinion. Only injustice can result from the publication of works like many of the recent superficial descriptions of Central America, whether they portray the five countries as foci of continual disorder, constitutionally incapable of self-government, and hence destined to absorption by a stronger power, or paint a ridiculously laudatory picture, based on official reports and on the utterances of the authorities rather than on critical observation. It is the purpose of this study to describe conditions simply as they appeared to the author during a sojourn of two years in the Isthmus, with the object of setting forth what the people of Central America have achieved since their declaration of independence and what problems confront them in their present stage of development.
The difficulties in the way of a careful study of the history and the economic and political conditions of the five republics are very great, because there is so little trustworthy written material. Historical works are especially unsatisfactory. The colonial period is ably treated in two or three books by Central American authors, but the development of the community since its separation from Spain, and the far-reaching economic and political changes which have taken place during the last century, have apparently never been studied by anyone who was equipped by historical training and by a knowledge of the country to interpret them. In attempting to obtain material for sketching the historical development of the Isthmus, therefore, I have been forced to rely on the very inadequate histories which do exist, which are little more than lists of presidents and revolutions, and upon a large number of political pamphlets, government documents, and memoirs of Central American leaders and of early travelers in the Isthmus. Much of this material is all but worthless because of the ignorance or the ulterior motives of the writers, but there is enough of value to reveal certain broad tendencies of economic and political development.
It is equally difficult to secure data concerning the condition of the country at present. Official publications can rarely be accepted as reliable because of the carelessness with which records are kept and statistical data are gathered by most of the departments, and because official statements about the material progress of the country and the activities of the authorities too often represent patriotic aspirations rather than accomplished facts. The differences in the use of terms and in standards of public service, moreover, are so great that it is difficult for a foreigner to obtain an idea of the actual situation in one of the countries merely by conversation with the authorities and other persons in the capital. The writer found it extremely helpful to supplement such conversations with trips to the provincial towns and through the rural districts. An acquaintance with the life and the character of the people outside the somewhat Europeanized cities, and an observation of the actual working of the political machinery, did much to make clear many things which otherwise might have been difficult to understand.
The courtesy of the officials of the five governments, and the hospitality extended to the traveler by all classes of the people, make a journey through Central America an experience upon which one can always look back with keen pleasure. It would be impossible here to thank individually the many friends who helped to make my stay in the Isthmus both pleasant and profitable. Nevertheless, I wish to express especially my appreciation of the assistance which I have received from Dr. L. S. Rowe, Mr. John M. Keith, Señor Luís Anderson, Señor Manuel Aragón, Mr. Boaz Long, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Jones, General Luís Mena, Mr. and Mrs. William Owen, Professor Philip M. Brown, Señor Francisco Castro and Doña Fidelina de Castro, Dr. Escolástico Lara, Dr. Juan B. Sacasa, Dr. Louis Schapiro, and General José María Moncada. Without their assistance, it would have been impossible to secure the information upon which this study is based.