ABSTRACT

John D. Martz's most apparent and perhaps most enduring characteristic was his fair-mindedness. John had a powerful sense of tradition—as is characteristic of our tribe, more of the academic than the religious. His loyalty to his North Carolina cohort during the "golden era" was ferocious and abiding. North Carolina, under the stewardship of Federico G. Gil, was one of the very few places in which the study of Latin America was not undertaken as a function of missionary work as it was for most of the nineteenth century, or of foreign policy as it became for most of the twentieth century. It was the failure in so many parts of Latin America to translate constitutional documents into everyday practices that prevented or stunted democratic growth in the region. It is also the lack of such institutionalization that made the area easy prey for English lords, Spanish conquistadors, and American imperialists.