The Dean of the Corps

The ambassador was visibly agitated. In a swirl of cigarette smoke, he pondered a diplomatic crisis: another ambassador was trying to hire away his cook. How could he thwart this act of piracy without causing an international incident? Baffled, he called his secretary through the intercom. "Get me the Dean," he said. "Tell him it's important.:"

Farther down Diplomatic Row, a new African ambassador fretted over the guest list for his first dinner party. Too proud to ask the State Department's protocol section for help, he telephoned the Dean.

At a Latin American embassy, a young diplomat worried over the delicate question of what to wear at an important occasion. He sighed with relief when he found in his mail a note reading "The Dean will wear . . ." The diplomat dressed accordingly.

Knowing the Niceties. Who is this all-important Dean? Well, he is Guillermo Sevilla-Sacasa, little Nicaragua's Ambassador to the U.S. By virtue of having served in Washington longer than any other foreign ambassador, Sevilla-Sacasa is the "Dean of the Corps." As such, he acts as adviser, style setter, protocol arbiter and ceremonial representative for the capital's entire ambassadorial corps. Dean since 1958, Sevilla-Sacasa attends about 600 official functions a year, greets every chief of state who visits Washington. To avoid contretemps, he has to remember the names, faces and precise protocol standings of each of the 111 other chiefs of mission in Washington, as well as the niceties of amity or animosity among the various countries.

With his waddling walk and jolly demeanor, pudgy Sevilla-Sacasa does not look very ambassadorial, but he has splendid qualifications for the deanship: a lot of pocket money, a large capacity for cocktails, an imperturbable stomach, a gift for small talk and a good memory. He takes his deanly duties seriously. "Thirty years ago," he clucks, "diplomats were expected to be aware of all phases of diplomacy before they came to Washington. Not so today. They need help, and this is what I am here for." One highly important help is Sevilla-Sacasa's method for introducing a newly arrived ambassador to the other envoys. It used to be that a new ambassador was required to call upon each chief of mission separately as soon as possible after arriving at his post. In Washington today, a new envoy working at the rate of one call a day would have to devote five months to meeting that requirement. At his own expense, Sevilla-Sacasa established a quarterly gathering of the ambassadorial corps, with a reception line for the newcomers.

Meeting Mr. Martini. Last week Sevilla-Sacasa rounded out 20 years as his country's ambassador to the U.S. In that post, he has served under four U.S. Presidents, eight Secretaries of State and six Nicaraguan chiefs of government. During his two decades in Washington, he has accumulated nine children, 34 medals and 4,400 photographs of himself and his family. A passionate baseball fan, he calls his children "my baseball team."

At 54, Sevilla-Sacasa is extraordinarily young to be a veteran Dean of the Corps. He was able to arrive at that eminence at a relatively early age because he got off to an early start. He became a member of Nicaragua's House of Representatives at 25, speaker of the house a year later. In 1943, he married the daughter of Nicaragua's late Dictator Anastasio Somoza, and shortly afterward his father-in-law dispatched him to Washington--and the cocktail circuit. "That," says Sevilla-Sacasa, "is when I meet my friend Mister Martini. When I was a young man, I played baseball. Now I play highball. Some people do not like cocktail parties. I love them. Some people do not like to meet people. I love people. I like to meet them." People like to meet him, too.

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