When Manuel Zelaya was deposed as president of Honduras with the support of the Supreme Court, the National Congress, the attorney general and most of his own party, much of Latin America went into conniptions about safeguarding the constitution. Of course, that was precisely the issue. Zelaya was about to traduce the constitution, which forbade extension of the chief executive's term, precisely his intention. This is common in the lower part of the Western Hemisphere, and it is the opus operandi of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras

THIS IS A poor country—so poor it can't even afford an oligarchy. People get by any way they can. In the central square near my hotel, a ragged seven-year-old girl sells newspapers, snappily making change from the pocket in her apron. In the countryside, barefoot peasants run up to my bus to sell cakes and pineapples. Half the peasant families of Honduras have no land, and the peasants are 80 percent of the people. This is, in fact, the poorest country in Central America. It ought also to be the ripest for revolution. But it's not.

This piece was originally published on October 20th, 1920.