Tipitapa Agreements

Tipitapa Agreements, the settlement marking the end of Nicaragua's Constitutionalist War. United States envoy Henry L. Stimson and José María Moncada met on 4 May 1927 in the small town of Tipitapa, a few miles east of Managua, to negotiate an end to the Constitutionalist War in Nicaragua. After Emiliano Chamorro's unsuccessful coup d'état, fellow Conservative Adolfo Díaz regained the presidency in 1926, despite the claims on the office by exiled former vice president Juan Bautista Sacasa, a Liberal. Under Moncada's protection, Sacasa returned from Mexico and appointed Moncada his minister of war. While Moncada mounted his campaign against the Conservatives, Sacasa set up a "constitutional government" in Puerto Cabezas.

To resolve the crisis, U.S. President Calvin Coolidge sent Stimson as his personal representative. Stimson first held negotiations with the Conservatives, who agreed to the retention of Díaz as president until the 1928 elections and to a general amnesty for all rebels. Once Stimson had secured Conservative support, he then met with Moncada—Sacasa refused to leave Puerto Cabezas. Stimson, realizing that the Liberals would not accept Díaz as president, advised Moncada to accept the terms of the agreement or risk fighting the U.S. In addition to the retention of Díaz as president until the 1928 elections (to be supervised by the U.S., which had given its tacit support to Moncada), the Tipitapa Agreements, as negotiated by Stimson and Moncada, guaranteed the Liberals control of six departments in exchange for an end to hostilities. Finally, they called for the organization of a nonpolitical National Guard under the leadership of U.S. officers.

On 5 May, Moncada told his troops of the agreements; President Díaz declared a general amnesty and appointed a number of Moncada's generals to government positions. All but one of Moncada's generals accepted the Tipitapa Agreements on 12 May 1927 through a signed telegram. The sole exception was Augusto César Sandino, who refused to lay down his arms.

See alsoChamorro Vargas, Emiliano; Díaz, Adolfo; Moncada, José María; Sandino, Augusto César.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Richard Millett, Guardians of the Dynasty (1977), esp. p. 55.

Neill Macaulay, The Sandino Affair (1985), esp. pp. 31-47.

Additional Bibliography

Dodd, Thomas J. Managing Democracy in Central America, A Case Study: United States Election Supervision in Nicaragua. 1927–33. Coral Gables, FL: North-South Center: University of Miami, 1992.

Baylen, Joseph O. "Sandino: Patriot or Bandit?" Hispanic American Historical Review 31, no. 3. (August 1951): 394-419.

                                        Shannon Bellamy