Cushin Alejandro Castro to To his Excellency the, December 19, 1877

Mr. Castro to Mr. Montufar.

Sir: I have received the note dated the 30th of November last, in which, in the name of, and according to instructions of, the Señor President of Guatemala, your excellency answers the one my predecessor had the honor to direct to you under date of September 30 of the present year.

The latter informed the supreme Government of Guatemala, in the manner required by the subject, that the municipalities and notable citizens of the Republic of Costa Rica had named as Provisional President the general-in-chief of the army, Señor Don Tomas Guardia, that in the mean time, a political code being established, the election of a Constitutional President could be proceeded with.

The note answering this was not sent to the minister of foreign relations, but to Dr. Don José Ma. Castro, who in effect was actually filling that elevated charge. I consider as an involuntary error the suppression of the practices which are rigorous in communications of this character, and I eagerly desire to consider it so, because it is impossible that it can be hidden from the indisputable skill of your excellency that, not directing it to the minister, but to the private person, your note would fail to reach any signification. In the view, then, and with the understanding that the note which your excellency has thought well to address me is a diplomatic one, I proceed to answer it in the name and by the instructions of the General President of Costa Rica.

It commences by not entering upon qualifying terms in respect to the illegality or legality of the extraordinary changes in this republic, and I cannot but felicitate your excellency for having laid aside so extemporaneous a qualification.

Costa Rica does not fear without doubt a comparative study in regard to this particular, but the customs of all cultivated people and the teachings of the most eminent publicists agree in reputing as an indiscreet disturbance of public peace and of the respect due from one state to another the slightest attempt to discuss the fundamental institutions to which either of them may voluntarily submit.

It continues: That, remembering the relations that existed between your government and the Señor General Guardia, the President of Guatemala, has seen with sorrow that they are neither pleasant nor satisfactory, nor do they argue happy results; and after explaining minutely two distinct charges against the person now at the head of the government of this republic, your excellency concludes by declaring that while that person remains in charge of the high trust confided to him by his fellow-citizens, the Government of Guatemala will not recognize the Government of Costal Rica.

Allow me to call your Excellence’s attention to the novelty such conduct may imply in diplomatic practice and principles. The antecedents of a Governor and the proceedings of a government can, without doubt, occasion the rupture of the good understanding reigning between two states in which it is seen that degrees may exist, and it may be conceived that they may reach occasions and may reach with frequency the terrible results of an armed struggle; but the recognition of a de-facto government is an entirely different thing, and it has not been the practice, until now, recognized or followed in any example worthy of mention, that there should be inspired sentiments of sympathy or antipathy, in order to recognize the self-evident fact that a certain government directs the destinies of a country.

I repeat, that the acknowledgment of a government does not depend nor can it depend on the sympathies that it inspires, but on the vitality with which it exists, and I will permit myself to interpret the note of your Excellency, deducing from its terms that the Supreme Government of Guatemala does not refuse to recognize the government presided over by Señor General Guardia, but that it breaks off with respect to him diplomatic relations heretofore existing.

This remains admitted, but no and never the unauthorized charges with which pretensions are made to justify a measure of so lamentable a character.

It is certain that the Señor General Don Tom as Guardia had the honor to represent Costa Rica as Diplomatic Envoy near the Government of Guatemala, and of concluding with that government a treaty of friendship and alliance that, on account of reasons that it is not now necessary to examine, was never exchanged, and therefore never complied with.

If the Señor General Guardia, in the discharge of his mission, had incurred the displeasure of your excellency’s government, I could understand that his conduct would be remembered as an obstacle to the maintenance of the good relations between our governments; but your Excellency acknowledges in your note that the diplomatic functions of the Señor General Guardia were discharged in a satisfactory manner.

It will be immediately seen that he is blamed for actions that do not belong to him; and, in truth, it is incomprehensible that he who was not at the time governor of Costa Rica should be now made responsible for the fault of the non-exchange and ratification of the treaty. These acts were outside and above the pleasure of the Minister, who received his instructions to celebrate it from his Government.

As regards the Señor General President of Costa Rica having ever pretended to promote internal discord in Guatemala, decorum will allow me to say nothing more than that your Excellency’s Government is badly informed, and that the Government of Costa Rica was surprised, and with justice, that there had been consigned to so important a document as your Excellency’s note an assertion of so grave a character, when the government in whose name it was made could not, if obliged to do so, uphold it with a single proof. Contradicted thus in accordance with historic truth the foundations of the order of affairs which the General President of Guatemala has esteemed convenient to establish with Costa Rica, this Government finds itself called upon by self-respect to accept the painful necessity.

Consequently, there will be published a decree closing official relations between the two republics; this note being the commentary of the inevitable determination and the only reply that corresponds to the manifestations which I answer.

Nothing, however, has been said that opposes, in any way, my concluding the present communication by subscribing myself with the most distinguished consideration.

Your Excellency’s obedient servant,