THE HAY-PAUNCEFOTE TREATY.
In 1893 a new corporation, known as the New Panama Canal Company, took
over all the assets of the De Lesseps Company, including the railway,
and the work of construction was continued, or at least not wholly
interrupted. Meanwhile the people of the United States were not greatly
displeased at the collapse of the great French enterprise. They became
more and more determined to construct an American canal under American
control. The Nicaraguan route was still favoured by many as compared
with that at Panama. In 1887 a surveying party was sent to Nicaragua,
and the next year the Maritime Canal Company was established to promote
the building of a canal there. It is important to notice this particular
scheme, for under it work was actually begun. Wharves, warehouses, and
a breakwater were constructed at Greytown, a railway was built, and
some progress made with the canal itself. Outside the Panama route this
was the only actual work of canal construction performed in Isthmian and
Central America. The project failed owing to the great depression of
trade which occurred in 1893 and the impossibility of getting more
capital. It should be noticed that these projects of constructing an
American canal at Nicaragua quite independently of Great Britain were
right in the teeth of the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty of 1850, which still
remained in force. Most sensible persons saw that the first preliminary
to an American canal was to get this treaty abrogated or modified. But
this purpose and canal schemes in general were delayed by the outbreak
in 1898 of the Spanish-American War.
This was a naval war, and the United States were to feel the
inconvenience and danger of having no sea communication between their
eastern and western coasts except _via_ the far southern extremity of
the continent. United fleet action over the whole theatre of the war was
rendered impossible. An event soon occurred which finally completed the
conviction of the American people that, in the words of President Grant,
"an American canal on American soil" was a national necessity. At the
beginning of the war the battleship _Oregon_, one of the finest ships in
the United States navy, lay off San Francisco. She was not wanted there,
but she was very badly wanted at the West Indies, the main scene of the
naval struggle. To get there the _Oregon_ had to sail 13,400 miles round
Cape Horn instead of 4,600 miles _via_ a Panama canal, if there had been
one. Everybody in the United States knew that the precious warship was
making that perilous journey exposed all the way to the attack of the
enemy. If she had been lost, the course of the war might have been very
different, and even the delay of this long passage was a serious
consideration at so critical a time. However, the vessel arrived safely
and in a record time off Florida, and the suspense and anxiety of the
American people were changed into jubilation. But "never again" was the
moral they drew from this painful and exciting experience.
At the end of the war a fresh canal campaign broke out in Congress, the
claims of Nicaragua and Panama being urged by their respective
champions. The outcome of this rivalry was the appointment of a
commission, the third of the kind, to go to the isthmus and investigate
both Nicaragua and Panama. We shall have something to say about the
report of this commission, which was issued in December 1900. But
already, before that appeared, negotiations had been set on foot between
the United States and Great Britain with regard to the Clayton-Bulwer
Treaty. Allusions to the subject by Mr. M'Kinley in his second message
to Congress had brought the question prominently before the people of
both countries. The president had spoken thus:--
That the construction of such a maritime highway is now more
than ever indispensable to that intimate and ready
communication between our eastern and western seaboards
demanded by the annexation of the Hawaiian Islands and the
prospective expansion of our influence and commerce in the
Pacific, and that our national policy now more imperatively
than ever calls for its control by this government, are
propositions which I doubt not the Congress will duly
appreciate and wisely act upon.
It is obvious that the annexation by the United States of Hawaii and the
Philippines, the beginnings of an American oversea empire, had greatly
strengthened the case for a canal owned and controlled by the United
States, and bringing the eastern coasts, the governmental centre of the
States, into far more direct communication with these new acquisitions
in the west.
Mr. M'Kinley's pronouncement was soon followed by conversations between
Mr. John Hay, the American Secretary of State, and Lord Pauncefote,
British Ambassador at Washington. The result was a treaty which was laid
before the Senate in February 1900. This first attempt, however, was
unsuccessful. The American people were annoyed to find that it did not
abrogate the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, but left the United States with
something very short of that independent control which they desired.
Amendments were introduced, and, so altered, the treaty was ratified by
the Senate on December 20, 1900. But in this new shape it proved
unacceptable to the British government, and it was permitted to lapse;
Lord Lansdowne, however, suggesting that another attempt at agreement
should be made.
It may be asked why Great Britain, who had hitherto taken the view that
it had nothing to gain, and perhaps much to lose, from the
reconsideration of the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, should now have been so
willing to bring it under review. There was a variety of reasons. The
government of the United States had protested for nearly fifty years
against the agreement, and this pertinacity, together with the changed
conditions since the Spanish-American War, may have weighed with the
British government. Then the Alaskan boundary question was at that time
still under discussion between the two countries, and a settlement was
proving difficult. An obstinate resistance to the United States over the
canal question might have continued that deadlock indefinitely. At this
time, too, England was at the beginning of the Boer War, and finding
that business a good deal more intricate than she had expected. The
sentiment of Anglo-American friendship had also grown much warmer since
the days when Lord Granville had repulsed the advances of Mr. Blaine.
In November 1901 a new treaty made its appearance. This was ratified by
the Senate without amendment, and was ultimately concluded between the
two Powers, being known as the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty.[3]
It is very important to note the provisions of this treaty, because it
establishes what is known as the political "status" of the new canal.
The Hay-Pauncefote expressly supersedes the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty and
provides for the construction of a canal (mentioning no particular
route) "under the auspices of the government of the United States,"
which country is "to have and enjoy all the rights incident to such
construction, as well as the exclusive right of providing for the
regulation and management of the canal." It adopts the principles of
"neutralization" which were embodied in the Treaty of Constantinople of
1888 in connection with the Suez Canal. Both treaties provide for:--
1. Freedom of transit in time of peace or war for the vessels of all
nations.
2. Freedom of the canal and its terminals from blockade.
3. A code of procedure for war-vessels entering or leaving the canal.
No special reference is made to the question of fortification, but the
United States are to be at liberty to maintain such military police
along the canal as may be necessary to protect it against lawlessness
and disorder. A treaty, however, subsequently concluded between the
United States and the Republic of Panama (known as the Hay-Bunau-Varilla
Treaty) contains the following provision:--
If it should become necessary at any time to employ armed
forces for the safety and protection of the canal, or of the
ships that make use of the same, or the railways and
auxiliary works, the United States shall have the right, at
all times and in its discretion, to use its police and its
land and naval forces or to establish fortifications for
these purposes.
But the most important provision of all related to the question of the
charges and other conditions of traffic through the canal. The meaning
of the section seems plain enough, though it became a subject of rather
acute controversy:--
The canal shall be free and open to the vessels of commerce
and war of all nations observing these rules, on terms of
entire equality; so that there shall be no discrimination
against any such nation, or its citizens or subjects, in
respect of the conditions and charges of traffic, or
otherwise. Such conditions and charges of traffic shall be
just and equitable.
This provision is reaffirmed in Article XVIII. of the Hay-Bunau-Varilla
Treaty. There is no doubt that the British government regarded this
promise of equal treatment as some compensation for the surrender of
those rights of joint construction and control which Great Britain
enjoyed under the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. In fact, Mr. Hay, in a
memorandum he sent to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations,
described the treaty as a sort of contract between Great Britain and
the United States by which the former gave up those rights just
mentioned in return for the "rules and principles" included in the new
treaty, the chief among these being, of course, the provision about
equality of treatment for all nations.
It was, therefore, a surprise when the United States government decided
that the expression "all nations" did not include the United States
themselves, and that it was quite open to them to give preferential
treatment to their "coastwise" traffic. Under the term "coastwise" the
United States include the sea-traffic not only between ports along a
continuous coast, but between such points as San Francisco or Washington
and the Philippine Islands. As a matter of fact, an amendment proposed
by Mr. Burd in the Senate, reserving to the United States the right of
favouring its "coastwise" traffic, had been defeated, when the new
treaty was under discussion.
But, leaving these controversial questions, the most important thing for
us to notice is that the Panama Canal has what is known as an
"international status." It is not quite the sole and absolute property
of the United States in the sense in which the Kiel Canal belongs to
Germany, the Corinth Canal to Greece, and the Amsterdam or North Sea
Canal to the Netherlands. Its status is governed by treaties which
impose certain obligations and restrictions upon the United States and
lay down certain rules of administration. It was intended at first to
make the status of the Panama and the Suez Canal identical. But there
are considerable differences. The "neutrality" of the Suez Canal is
guaranteed by all the Powers of Europe, that of the Panama Canal by two
only, England and the United States, and it is safeguarded and
maintained by the United States alone. Then the Suez Canal is and must
remain unfortified, while the Panama Canal will be strongly fortified by
the United States.
The reader may wonder what precisely is meant by the word "neutral" as
applied to the new waterway. The position will be as nearly as possible
that indicated by Dr. Vaughan Cornish in the following passage:--
If there be a war in which the United States is not a party,
the canal will be used by belligerents in exactly the same
way as was the Suez Canal--for example, in the
Russo-Japanese War--and the government of the United States
has pledged itself to see that such neutrality is preserved.
But if there be a war in which the United States is a party,
the circumstances of fortification and operation by the
United States in fact render it impossible for the other
belligerent to use the canal, and are intended to have that
effect. This being so, the United States is preparing to
defend the canal from attack. Thus it is important to the
proper understanding of the undertaking on which the United
States government has embarked that we should clearly
realize that the canal is only neutral in a restricted
sense.[4]
As a matter of fact the status of the Panama Canal lies somewhere
between neutralization and American control. The Hay-Pauncefote Treaty
also lays down the rules which are to be observed by the ships of war
of a belligerent using the canal and the waters adjacent to the
canal--that is, within three marine miles of either end. They are
similar to those in force at Suez, and need not be repeated here.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] Appendix i.
[4] "The Panama Canal and its Makers," pp. 42, 43.