U. S. Mayor

Last week came tidings of that benevolent dictator, that bantam Mussolini, the diminutive yet lion-hearted President Augusto B. Leguia y Salcedo of Peru, who "tips the scales at 98 pounds of dynamite and determination."

The Methodist Episcopal Board of Foreign Missions announced at New York that Dictator-President Leguia has taken it upon himself to appoint a U. S. Methodist Episcopal medical missionary, Dr. Eugene A. MacCornack, as Alcalde (Mayor) of the ancient Peruvian city of Callao, seaport to Lima. Straightway it was recalled that Dr. MacCornack has long been superintendent of the British-American Hospital at Lima, Peruvian capital, and that he has frequently had occasion to attend professionally both the indomitable Senor Leguia and numerous members of his militant Administration.

Without becoming lurid, it may be baldly stated that no less than nine major revolutions and at least a score of minor revolts have been put down during the ten odd years in which Senor Leguia has worn the presidential sash of Peru. The old semifeudal, politico-military aristocracy has resisted long and bitterly the dominance of Leguia, admittedly a champion of the middle class, of industrialism, and even of the aboriginal Indians of Peru, who have been exploited immemorially by the landed descendants of the Spanish conquerors.

Ergo, Senor Leguia is even now forced to maintain an elaborate system of private guards and espionage to protect his life. Often it has been asked whether such an absolutist can justify his rule. Always Leguia has been able to point to his signal achievements in administering the finances of the republic and extending its commercial prosperity. Today he is in the habit of asserting that the national debt of Peru is smaller per capita than that of any other nation. Often he remarks with satisfaction upon the large investments of U. S. capital in Peru, and the number of U. S. business men who have gone thither.

Critics opined that the installation of a U. S. Mayor at Callao is in line with President Leguia's known policy of favoring U. S. citizens in matters civil and local. At the same time it was recalled that he has contended bitterly for every last square inch of Tacna-Arica which can be allocated to Peru under President Coolidge's award (TIME, April 21, 1924).