of any other interoceanic canal or of any new railway through or across her territory from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans, without the express consent of the United States being first obtained. A stipulation with regard to the neutrality of the route is contained in this treaty: "The entrance to the canal shall be rigorously closed to the troops of another or others, including their vessels and munitions of war." This treaty was summarily rejected by the Colombian Congress.

On the appointment of Mr. Grant as President of the United States, Mr. Stephen A. Hurlbut was sent to Colombia in order to conclude a new treaty for the construction of the canal as a government enterprise. The result was the Treaty of Bogotá of January 26, 1870, by which the canal was to be opened to all nations at peace with both parties, on terms of absolute equality, but to be rigorously closed against the flags of all nations at war with either. The United States agreed to aid in protecting the canal against foreign attack and invasion. Mr. Hurlbut seems to have been extremely sanguine in his expectations that the treaty would be readily ratified by the Colombian Congress. Soon, however, he perceived that the matter was not so easy. The Colombian administration objected to a provision of the treaty whereby Colombia would make herself party in any war in which the United States should become involved. Señor Tapata, the Secretary of Foreign Relations, notified to Mr. Hurlbut that his government would insist on a radical change of such stipulation in view of the political complications that might result if the provision were

stand.1 As it was expected, important modifications were introduced by the Colombian Congress. They so far traversed the views of the United States that the treaty did not prove acceptable to the Senate of this republic.

The diplomatic action of the Department of State became energetic soon after the grant made by Colombia to a private French company for the construction of the Panama Canal in 1878. The United States, no doubt, were jealous of this enterprise from the economic point of view. Endeavours, therefore, were made to undermine the French company by means of rival routes in Central America and Tehuantepec.2 But the question really became of the greatest importance in its connection with the Monroe Doctrine. Under the later interpretations of this most flexible of all maxims, Monroe's dictum had gone beyond its negative assertions and adopted also positive principles as the guide of American diplomacy, whenever there was an opportunity for enhancing the moral supremacy of the United States. It was rumoured at the time that M. de Lesseps was inviting, on behalf of the French company, a coalition of European powers to guarantee and defend the

1 In view of this fact there cannot be any reason for Mr. Hurlbut's strange supposition that the change of policy on the part of the Colombian Government was due to some petty ceremonies gone through by Mr. Bunch, Her Britannic Majesty's Chargé d'affaires. According to Mr. Hurlbut, "the change of policy was due, without doubt, to the action of Mr. Bunch. He had been exceedingly active for two weeks past, and used some rather strange means to deepen the hold he has on this people. For example, on Good Friday the British flag was displayed at half-mast, and Mr. Bunch attended every Mass at the cathedral, carrying a lighted candle in some procession which made part of the service" (Compilation of Documents, 1282).

2 Keasbey, op. cit. pp. 362 et seq.

neutrality of the Isthmus. This necessarily, in the opinion of the United States, affected their traditional position in the New World. President Hayes hastened to impart his views to the world on the canal question and the Monroe Doctrine, in his message of March 8, 1880. The message is couched in unequivocal terms: "The policy of this country is a canal under American control. The United States cannot consent to the surrender of this control to any European powers." He urged that the canal would be the great ocean thoroughfare between the shores of the Union on the Atlantic and the Pacific, and "virtually a part of the coast-line of the United States." concluded that it was "the right and the duty of the United States to assert and maintain such supervision and authority over any interoceanic canal across the Isthmus that connects North and South America as will protect our national interests.” 2

He

Views similar to those just quoted were also expressed by Mr. Evarts, Secretary of State, in his report presented to the President on the same date (March 8, 1880). This report was in answer to a petition of Congress, which seems to have been anxious for information on the French project. Mr. Evarts thought that the question was for his government "a territorial one, in the administration of which, as such, it must exercise a potential control."

Mr. Evarts' energies did not stop here. In order to defeat the French project in its entirety, and to gain at the same time untold advantages for his

2

1 The italics are our own.

Messages of the Presidents, vol. vii. pp. 585, 586.

3 Compilation of Documents, vol. iii. p. 1496.

country, thus carrying the Monroe Doctrine to the extent which he thought it should have, he sought to conclude a treaty with Colombia whereby it was intended to declare that any concession for the execution of an interoceanic canal, heretofore made or hereafter to be made by Colombia, was and should be subject to the rights of the United States of America as guarantor of the neutrality of the Isthmus and of the sovereignty of Colombia over isthmian territory, and that the consent of the United States must be considered as a preliminary necessary to the validity of any future grant or the modification of an existing one. It is hardly necessary to say that this clause was designed for the purpose of doing away with the contract between Colombia and the French company. The government of the United States had already indicated its dissatisfaction with the grant made without previously obtaining its consent, and had also informed Colombia that, in the view of the United States, the necessity for such consent was and would be maintained as a consequence of the guarantee undertaken by the treaty of 1846. The diplomatic tactics of Mr. Evarts were not sufficiently veiled, and the result was that the Colombian Government disdainfully refused to consider a proposal for a treaty whereby her right to grant such concessions was questioned.1

In the meantime the question had been taken up by Congress. The views of the administration were shared both by the Senate and the House of Representatives. In the discussions that took place they emphasised the opinion that was already current in Compilation of Documents, vol. iii. pp. 1513, 1534 et seq.

the political sections of the country, by recording in a resolution "that it is the interest and right of the United States to have the possession, direction, control, and government of any canal, railroad, or any other artificial communication to be constructed across

the Isthmus . . . and in view of the magnitude of this interest, it is the duty of the United States to insist that if built, and by whomsoever the same may be commenced, prosecuted, or completed, and whatever the nationality of the corporators or the source of their capital, that the interest of the United States, and their right to possess and control the said canal or other artificial communication, will be asserted and maintained whenever in their opinion it shall become necessary.

"1

But it was clear to Congress that the greatest difficulty in the way of putting into practice the then national policy of the country was the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, that stood threatening, always ready to reduce to atoms any advances that tended to the acquisition of an exclusive control of the canal route-in fact, a powerful estoppel to the development of the Monroe Doctrine, in its new form, in connection with maritime communications across the Isthmus. Accordingly the Senate and the House of Representatives, on April 16, 1880, in a joint resolution requested the President to take immediate steps for the abrogation of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty.

President Garfield then came to power, and it fell to the lot of Mr. Blaine, his Secretary of State, to open the controversy. He showed himself greatly concerned on account of the rumours that were then

1 Compilation of Documents, vol. iii. p. 1571.