Transcribing the Past

   Here is the text of the letter written by Archbishop Oscar Romero to then US President Jimmy Carter urging him to cease supporting military and police death squads in El Salvador and to reaffirm his stated commitments to human rights. A month after writing this letter, Oscar Romero was gunned down by agents of the Junta on the 24th of March 1980. In the last few days, news has appeared in the national press that worries me greatly. According to the reports your government is studying the possibility of economic and military support and assistance to the present junta government. Because you are a Christian and because you have shown that you want to defend human rights, I venture to set forth for you my pastoral point of view concerning this news and to make a request. I am very worried by the news that the government of the United States is studying a form of abetting the arming of EI Salvador by sending military teams and advisors to "train three Salvadoran ba...