Guggenheim Baptised

Copper Tycoon Harry Frank Guggenheim, whom President Hoover sent to Cuba as Ambassador (TIME, Dec. 2), last week had his baptism by diplomatic fire.

Two Cuban editors, one a former Congressman, had been arrested by soldiers and lodged in a military prison because they had printed attacks on certain changes in the Cuban Constitution about to be put through by tortoise-bespectacled President Machado.

Friends of the arrested editors rushed to the U. S. Embassy, handed the doorman a petition begging Ambassador Guggenheim to invoke the Platt Amendment-- imposed by the U. S. on Cuba in 1910-- by which the U. S. may intervene to preserve order and republican government.

Hot on the petitioners' heels came correspondents to question Ambassador Guggenheim. What was he going to do? Would he leave the editors to rot in jail on a trumped up charge of sedition? Would he act with all the power and majesty of the President whose personal representative he is?

It was an awkward, delicate moment-- Copperman Guggenheim's first as a diplomat. He rose to the occasion with a declaration that he would neither admit nor deny having received the petition which was handed to the doorman. What action Ambassador Guggenheim then took behind scenes is not known, but two days later President Machado ordered the two editors, Carlos Dellunde of Santiago's La Region and Jose Arroyo Ramos of Santiago's La Independence, released from jail.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.