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1902.]

PROJECTED TREATIES WITH COLOMBIA AND NICARAGUA.

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Washington, Señor Silva, in a letter to Rear Admiral Walker, President of the Isthmian Canal Commission, stated that the United States would have "actual but not sovereign control" over the strip of territory, five miles wide, for which the United States must pay an annual rental to compensate for certain losses caused by the sale. Colombia would rent the land on a two-hundred-year lease, with the right of renewal. The constitution of Columbia forbids the transfer of land in sovereignty.

On March 31 Señor Concha delivered to Secretary Hay a definite protocol setting forth the terms under which Colombia was ready to concede the rights necessary for the construction of the Isthmian canal. Definite consent was given to the sale of the entire rights of the new Panama Canal Company to the United States for $40,000,000. It was understood that the protocol included adequate provisions for the completion, maintenance, operation, control and protection of a Panama canal by our government. The

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city of Panama, which practically is the State of Panama, was excluded from United States sovereignty.

Meanwhile there was careful study of the provisions of the new Hay-Pauncefote treaty, which impressed some as too generous in its terms on the part of Great Britain. to mean all that it seemed to say. When the first Hay-Pauncefote treaty was up for consideration, President Roosevelt said:

"I most sincerely hope that the pending treaty concerning the Isthmian canal will not be ratified unless amended so as to provide that the canal when built shall be wholly under the control of the United States alike in peace and war. This seems to me vital, no less from the standpoint of our sea power than from the standpoint of the Monroe doctrine."

The fact that the President transmitted the treaty to the Senate was proof that he believed it complied with his views. Since it superseded the Clayton-Bulwer treaty it necessarily abrogated that instrument and formally released us from certain restrictions on our right of free action in Central America, which had been unwisely incurred a half century before. Further, it wholly eliminated the policy of a joint guarantee of the neutrality of the canal, either with Great Britain or with all of the maritime powers who decided to become parties to the agreement. By making the United States solely responsible for the neutrality of the canal our government became the sole judge of what constituted any infraction of that neutrality. The new treaty also omitted the former explicit prohibition of the fortification of the canal and adjacent waters.

All these features were of vast and far-reaching value to the United States, but a close study of the instrument raised some questions as to the actual scope and meaning of certain of the terms. Thus, while the prohibition against fortifications was removed, the text failed clearly to recognize the inherent right of the United States to fortify its own canal, if it saw fit to do so. Some will contend that the absence of any prohibition. means the right to fortify, but others could maintain that the failure to recognize expressly the right to fortify is really a prohibition against doing so.

The treaty adopted the general principles of neutrality and equal privileges contained in the Suez rules. This was well, but if the Suez rules were to be interpreted as applying to this nation and to its adversary in time of war, then it was clear that the treaty did not provide for the American ideal of a canal.

A new article stipulated that no change of sovereignty or of the international relations of the countries traversed by the canal should affect the general principle of neutralization or the obligations of the United States under the present treaty. Regarding this the N. Y. Sun asked: "Exactly what does this mean? Does it mean, for example, that if what is now Nicaragua and what is now Costa Rica should by any chance come, fifty or a hundred years hence, under the sovereignty of the United States, we should be obliged then, and for all future time, to hold open a waterway through our own territory for the battleships of any nation at war with us? The idea is incomprehensible. No nation on the face of the earth would agree to turn its own property and its own territory into means and a channel of vantage for an attacking enemy."

In May, 1902, Secretary Hay sent to Chairman Morgan of the Senate Committee on Interoceanic Canal and to Chairman Hepburn of the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce copies of the projected treaties with Colombia and Nicaragua respecting the construction of an Isthmian canal, including the correspondence relating thereto. No definite proposition had been received from the government of Costa Rica, but its minister stated that his government was ready to enter into a satisfactory arrange ment with that of the United States, but before doing so it would be necessary for his government to adopt a constitutional amendment authorizing the necessary concessions or to have the matter referred to public opinion in some other way. These steps would undoubtedly be settled as soon as our Congress decided upon the route of the canal. Secretary Hay expressed the hope that the information thus conveyed would be of help in deciding upon the route, and he added that the President earnestly hoped there

would be no more delay than was unavoidable in entering upon this great work, which is so important and beneficent to this country and the world. The treaty of Colombia as submitted provided:

(1) That the Government of Colombia authorizes the new Panama Canal Company to sell its rights to the United States.

(2) The United States shall have the exclusive right to construct and operate the

canal.

(3) The United States shall have a zone five kilometres wide for the canal,.for a period of 100 years, with the privilege of renewal, the zone to be neutral territory guaranteed by the United States, a joint commission created by the United States and Colombia to enforce sanitary and police regulations.

(4) The sovereignty of Colombia to be maintained over the territory of the canal. (5) Lighthouses, ports and other aids to navigation to be constructed by the United States, also hospitals, and necessary aqueducts and drainage works in Panama and Colon.

(6) Colombia will not cede or lease to any foreign government any of its islands or its harbors that might interfere with the use or the safety of the canal, and to enable Colombia to carry out this stipulation the United States shall give to Colombia the material support that may be necessary.

(7) Damages arising from the construction of the canal shall be appraised by a joint commission, to be paid by the United States alone.

(8) The ports at either end of the canal shall be free, and dues in the canal equal for all nations.

(9) No taxes shall be imposed on the property used in constructing the canal. (10) The canal shall be neutral in perpetuity.

(11) Forces necessary to protect the canal shall be provided by Colombia, but if she cannot effectively do so she may call on the United States to do so.

(12) The United States shall begin work on the canal in two years after the exchange of ratifications of the treaty.

(13) For the privileges granted the United States shall pay Colombia $7,000,000, and after fourteen years a reasonable annuity, to be fixed by arbitration if necessary.

(14) This concession shall lapse if in five years the United States shall not have begun the construction of the canal nor completed it within the period allowed (twentyfour years).

The treaty with Nicaragua provided:

(1) Nicaragua leases in perpetuity to the United States the exclusive right to build and operate a canal through its territory, and the United States shall guarantee the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of the Republic of Nicaragua.

(2) A strip three miles on each side of the route selected shall be known as the canal district, and areas of lands and waters within that district shall pass into the possession, use and control of the United States without cost or charge. Damages arising from the building of the canal shall be ascertained by a joint commission and their awards shall be paid by the United States.

(3) The sovereignty of Nicaragua shall continue over the canal district, but the United States may enforce peace and order by the use of its forces.

(4) Free ports shall be established at the terminals of the canal and no discrimination shall be made as to tolls.

(5) The canal shall be opened to all nations, shall never be blockaded, war vessels of a belligerent shall not remain in the canal more than twenty-four hours, shall not revictual in the canal, nor shall a belligerent disembark troops or munitions of war in the canal.

(6) The United States shall pay and discharge Nicaragua from all liability on account of claims of citizens of the United States arising prior to the signing of the treaty.

(7) The United States shall pay $6,000,000 and an annual rental of $25,000 as compensation for the privileges granted.

It will be seen from the foregoing that this important matter has been so fully discussed that there is no excuse for any one not being fully informed as to every aspect of it. It seems strange that, with the measureless advantages of an interoceanic canal plain to every one, our country should have allowed so many years to pass without taking a decisive step toward its construction. Our government has spent millions upon millions of dollars in public improvements, a vast number of which were of no use at all, but were made more to satisfy the clamor in certain sections, and which, it must also be added, were too often based upon supposed political advantages expected to result therefrom, and yet this world's natural pathway has been allowed to remain choked and unavailable, when with the wealth at our command it ought to have been cleared more than a generation ago.

The arguments in favor of each route have been given. We have referred to the peril which it was claimed by the friends of the Panama route would always impend over the other. Relating to this, it has been stated that Admiral Walker, President of the Isthmian Canal Commission, and who strongly favored the Panama course, made the remark that it was not a question of earthquakes but of proximity of volcanoes. "One route has volcanoes and the other has not. Which is safe?" The course through Nicaragua leads under the shadow of Omotepe, a volcano capable at any time and without previous warning, of repeating the appalling work of Mont Pelée in Martinique and destroying in the twinkling of an eye a work that required a score of years in construction and involved the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars.

It may be added that Lord Pauncefote, who was so prominently identified with the treaty which opened the way for the construction of the Isthmian canal and who was held in high esteem by the whole American nation, died in Washington on May 24,

1902.

CHAPTER XII.

ROOSEVELT'S FIRST ADMINISTRATION, 1901-1904-CONTINUED THE PRESIDENT'S VIEWS ON QUESTIONS OF NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL IMPORTANCE.

HEN by the Constitution of the United States Theodore Roosevelt became presi

WHE

dent, he announced that his aim would be to carry out in spirit and letter the policy of his lamented predecessor. This seemed appropriate and was pleasing to the friends of both, for, having been elected upon the same platform, his course could not well be otherwise.

You may recall that when William Henry Harrison died in 1841 he was succeeded by John Tyler, the vice-president, such succession being the first of that nature in the history of our country. It soon became clear that Tyler intended to follow a course that was distasteful in the highest degree to the Whigs. They tried to check him by having it declared that the constitutional duty of a vice-president succeeding to the chief magistracy was to follow the policy of the president whom he succeeded,—that he was his heir, so to speak, and the Constitution did not permit him to do otherwise than to act as his predecessor would have acted had he lived.

This view of the question, however, was untenable. When a man becomes the constitutional president of the United States, no matter by what means, he is as much the chief executive as if he had been duly elected, and is therefore free to adopt what views he believes to be just and for the best interests of his country. President Roosevelt was honest and patriotic, personally brave, an athlete, impetuous and cultured. He assumed his high office with the best wishes of everyone. But some of those who admired his character feared that what might be called his virtues would lead him into error,—that his impatience with trickery, dishonesty, and the oily ways of the politician might cause him to commit some blunder. But when such a man assumes the responsibilities of one of the most exalted offices on the face of the earth, he feels its gravity and is sure to rise to its vast requirements. President Roosevelt remained as fearless and outspoken, but he was also thoughtful and deliberate, and counseled with the wisest of advisers before taking any step or adopting any course of action upon an important public

measure.

You will understand, therefore, the profound interest with which all citizens read the first annual message of President Roosevelt. No such interest could attach to the succeeding messages, for they would necessarily be in a line with the first and would be a continuance of the same policy. Some thought that under the spur of grief and indignation over the death of President McKinley his successor had spoken too impulsively of his intention of following in his footsteps, and that he might in his cooler moments deviate from the path he had thus laid out for himself.

But his first annual message to Congress would be the deliberate expression of his

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