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Rh, a term now formally changed to rebels, while royalist supporters were to be called realistas fieles. Further, local authorities were required to send in a disavowal of the insurgent deputies who claimed to represent them, which resulted in a stream of professed adhesions from all parts of the country; and churchmen were strictly bidden to combat the constitution. The main argument was based on the false charge that it fostered tolerance and heresy, and on this ground the inquisition also joined in the tirade, declaring excommunicated even those who merely held the document in possession or failed to denounce other holders. Orders so extreme could only serve to lower the influence of the framers from their necessarily wide-spread failure to receive effect.

Whatever the effect of the constitution at home, it certainly lent a dignity and legality to the insurgent cause which could not fail to leave a favorable impression abroad. Nor was this impression devoid of value; for as the cause grew weaker, the greater became the necessity for foreign aid in loans and perhaps in troops, while intercourse must in any case be opened for the purchase of fire-arms and ammunition. Projects to this end were confined almost exclusively to the United States, and although hopes had so far proved vain they were never abandoned. In June 1814 they received a marked impulse from the arrival at Nautla of a 'General' Humbert, claiming to be an agent of the northern republic. Anaya went with him to New Orleans, only to find him a mere corsair.