Page:Difficulties Between Mexico and Guatemala.djvu/12

 natural union of the republics of the continent in the face of the tendencies of other and distant forms of government to influence the internal affairs of Spanish America.

It is especially anxious, in the pursuance of this great policy, to see the Central American Republics more securely united than they have been in the past, in protection of their common interests, which interests are, in their outward relations, identical in principle with those of Mexico and of the United States. It feels that everything which may lessen the good will and harmony so much to be desired between the Spanish Republics of the Isthmus must in the end disastrously affect their mutual well-being.

The responsibility for the maintenance of this common attitude of united strength is, in the President's conception, shared by all, and rests no less upon the strong States than upon the weak.

Without, therefore, in any way, prejudging the contention between Mexico and Guatemala, but acting as the unbiased counselor of both, the President deems it is his duty to set before the Government of Mexico his conviction of the danger which would ensue to the principles which Mexico has so signally and successfully defended in the past should disrespect be shown to the boundaries which separate her from her weaker neighbors, or should the authority of force be resorted to in the establishment of rights over territory which they claim, without the conceded justification of her just title thereto. And especially would the President regard as an unfriendly act toward the cherished plan of upbuilding strong republican governments in Spanish America, if Mexico, whose power and generosity should be alike signal in