The night Luis Muñoz Marín fueled Richard Nixon’s thoughts

After a disastrous “goodwill tour” of Latin America in 1958, Richard Nixon, before returning to Washington, stopped in Puerto Rico – home turf for the badly beaten and emotionally shaken vice president who was attacked, kicked and pelted with eggs in Caracas and called “corrupt” during hostile demonstrations in Lima. Welcoming him with open arms was Washington-devotee Luis Muñoz Marín,the island’s first popularly elected governor, who invited him to spend the night.

Both hearty imbibers in their heyday, Muñoz Marín and Nixon stayed up chatting and drinking until the morning wee hours. In 1971, President Nixon in a phone conversation with then UN Ambassador Daniel Patrick Moynihan described what happened. The following transcript is part of a collection of recorded phone call conversations during the Nixon White House years compiled by the National Security Archive at George Washington University. The purpose of the Oct. 7, 1971 phone call was for the president to discuss with the ambassador whether Africans have the capability of leading their nations.

Nixon: I'm not saying that Blacks cannot govern. I am saying they have a hell of a time.
Moynihan: Mm-hmm.
Nixon: Now that must demonstrate something. Now, having said that, let’s look at Latin America. Latin America has had 150 years of trying at it and they don’t have much going down there either. Mexico is a one party government; Colombia, they trade it off every two years; Venezuela is tip tee-toe, and the rest are dictatorships except for Allende, which is a communist dictatorship – elected, but communist. Now, let me come back to another point. I think you may have heard me tell of my conversation with Muñoz Marín who, incidentally, was capable of governing.
Moynihan: Yes.
Nixon: In ’58, after Lima and Caracas, I stopped there. And he and I talked all night… and he, drinking his scotch and all, and he really lived it up… [laughing] And I, trying to keep up with him – practically dead! But he made a very interesting point, very late – in the early morning hours. He said, look, he says, I shouldn’t say this, he said, “But Mr. Vice President, my people have many fine qualities, I mean, they’re courteous… they’re, they’re family people…in the arts… and you know, philosophy, et cetera.” But he said, “I will have to admit, my people” – speaking of Latins generally – “have never been very good at government.”
Moynihan: Yeah.
Nixon: Now let’s look at that. The Italians aren’t any good at government. The Spanish aren’t any good at government.
Moynihan: Yeah.
Nixon: The French have had a hell of a time, and they’re half Latin. And all of Latin America’s not any good at government. They either go to one extreme or the other. It’s either a family – well, three extremes: family oligarchy, or a dictatorship – a dictatorship on the right or one on the left. Very seldom in the center. Now having said all that, however, as you compare the Latin dictatorships, governments, etc. and their forms of government, they are – they at least do it their way. It is an orderly way which works relatively well. They have been able to run the damn place! Now what I am getting [at] is this: Asians are capable of governing themselves, one way or another. We and the Caucasians have learned it after slaughtering each other in religious wars and other wars for many, many years, including a couple in the last – this century. The Latins do it in a miserable way, but they do it. But the Africans just can’t run things. Now that’s a very, very fundamental point in the international scene. See my point?