Castillo v. Accion

Argentina's Acting President last week put his foot down, forbade 5,000 mass meetings scheduled throughout the country by the militant, pro-British Accion Argentina as public demonstrations of "adherence to the American front" and "faith in the ultimate victory of democracy." On the eve of the meetings, expected to turn out 100,000 people in Buenos Aires alone, Acting President Ramon S. Castillo decreed that the "attitude of Accion Argentina is contrary to the neutrality declared by the Argentine Government and to the dignity of the Argentine nation."

When the Governor of Entre Rios Province, Enrique Mihura, entered a vigorous protest, Acting President Castillo made his position even clearer:

"There are two things I am not accepting. One is that the governments of the provinces act in a manner affecting the executive's direction of foreign policy. The other is that foreign policy be directed by public assemblies."

In answer Enrique Mihura dusted off the Argentine Constitution's freedom-of-speech guarantee, promised to insure order, permitted meetings in his Province to proceed on schedule.

For telling a political rally at the resort town of Tigre that Ramon Castillo abridged the rights of the people in banning the Accion meetings, Jose Carlos Vidal, Radical Party campaign speaker, was arrested, charged with disrespect to the Government. Police moved in on the meeting with clubs and warning pistol shots in the air, snipped the wires of the public-address system.

Cried El Pampero, Axis propaganda daily operating under a freedom-of-press guarantee from Ramon Castillo: "Action Argentina, the bridgehead of Yankee warmongers in our country, must be dissolved by executive power."

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