A tight cordon of tanks and armored trucks circled slowly around Guatemala City's "Stadium of the Revolution." Inside, under a blazing sun, 50,000 Guatemalans applauded a ceremony all but unprecedented in the little republic's turbulent historythe peaceful and constitutional transmission of power from one President to another.
The retiring President was Juan José Arévalo, who, after the 1944 revolution, had been called to the post from Argentine exile, had confounded the prophets by surviving 28 revolutionary plots and serving out his full six-year term. His successor: Colonel Jacobo Arbenz, 37, son...
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