IA
106TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. J. RES. 77
Notifying the Government of Panama of the nullity of the Carter-Torrijos
treaties and recognizing the validity of the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty
with respect to control of the Panama Canal Zone.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
NOVEMBER 9, 1999
Mrs. CHENOWETH-HAGE introduced the following joint resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Armed Services
JOINT RESOLUTION
Notifying the Government of Panama of the nullity of the
Carter-Torrijos treaties and recognizing the validity of
the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty with respect to control
of the Panama Canal Zone.
Whereas the United States Canal in Panama, linking the Pa-
cific and Atlantic Oceans, is one of the most strategically
important naval choke points in the world, essential to
our national defense and vital to our economic well-being;
Whereas occupation, damage, or destruction of this crucial
waterway by a hostile power—whether an unfriendly
Panamanian Government, terrorist organization, or other
foreign government—could be calamitous to the United
States in time of war and disastrous to our economy even
in time of peace;
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Whereas the Republic of Panama does not have an army,
navy, air force, or other military or police capability ade-
quate for the defense of such a strategic asset;
Whereas the communist government of the People’s Republic
of China has been pursuing an aggressive expansionist
agenda in Panama, the Caribbean, and Latin America,
while, at the same time carrying out a concerted and
much-publicized campaign of bribery and espionage
reaching to the highest offices of the United States;
Whereas Hutchison Whampoa, a front company for the Peo-
ple’s Liberation Army of China, utilizing corrupt prac-
tices, has acquired leases giving it control of the ports of
Cristobal and Balboa at the Atlantic and Pacific ends of
the Panama Canal, positioning the People’s Republic of
China for de facto control of the Canal;
Whereas the People’s Republic of China, through its agent,
Hutchison Whampoa, is also in the process of taking over
the Rodman Naval Station and other military facilities
being abandoned by the United States, and has the exclu-
sive authority to hire the pilots who control all traffic
through the Canal;
Whereas the People’s Republic of China, a totalitarian re-
gime, refers to the United States in its military literature
and official Communist Party statements as its ‘‘main
enemy’’ and has aligned itself with other communist re-
gimes and terrorist states avowedly hostile to the United
States;
Whereas China expert Dr. Michael Pillsbury of the National
Defense University testified to the Senate Select Com-
mittee on Intelligence in September 1997 that the Chi-
•HJ 77 IH
nese military officials have written extensively of their na-
tion’s intention ‘‘to defeat the United States’’;
Whereas in spite of these manifest dangers, the Government
of the United States is pursuing a policy of transferring
possession, ownership, and control of the Panama Canal
and Canal Zone, which includes the United States mili-
tary bases, to the Government of Panama, in accordance
with the 1977 Carter-Torrijos treaties, which were never
legally ratified by either the United States or Panama;
Whereas in their respective instruments of ratification, the
United States and Panama did not agree to the same
text of the treaties, and, in fact, each party stipulated to
conditions that are in fundamental conflict with, and mu-
tually exclusive of, the demands of the other;
Whereas one of the most basic and universally accepted prin-
ciples of international law concerning treaties holds that
the parties must agree to the same written text, or there
is no ‘‘meeting of the minds’’ and, thus no treaty;
Whereas Article 20.2 of the 1969 Vienna Convention on the
Law of Treaties states unequivocally that ‘‘a reservation
requires acceptance by all the parties’’; and whereas the
‘‘Restatement of the United States Foreign Relations
Law’’ declares unambiguously that ‘‘If the other state
has made a reservation . . . the Senate . . . will take it
fully into account in acting on the treaty,’’ and, more-
over, that ‘‘Senate consent to the acceptance of the res-
ervation is required’’;
Whereas ratification of the Carter-Torrijos treaties by the
United States Senate was contingent upon the DeConcini
Reservation in the United States version guaranteeing
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the United States the right to use military force, with or
without Panama’s consent, to keep the Canal open;
Whereas the United States Senate was not informed that the
President of the United States had secretly agreed with
the regime of Omar Torrijos in Panama not to include
the essential DeConcini Reservation in Panama’s text
version; and, moreover, that the President of the United
States added further to this illegal and unconstitutional
action by secretly accepting Panama’s counter-reserva-
tion, which explicitly repudiates the DeConcini Reserva-
tion and subjects United States right of military inter-
vention to ‘‘principles of mutual respect and coopera-
tion’’;
Whereas these discrepancies in the treaty texts involve the
most substantive and fundamental contradictions imag-
inable affecting matters of the most serious import to
both the United States and Panama, and, thus, render
the ratifications by both parties invalid, null, and void;
Whereas additional serious violations of legal norms and the
Constitutions of both the United States and Panama also
render the Carter-Torrijos treaties of transfer and neu-
trality null and void, and, therefore, of no legal standing;
Whereas therefore, the original Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty of
1903 between the United States and Panama—under
which the United States legally purchased the Canal
Zone territory from Colombia, Panama, and private land-
owners, and then, at great cost, built the Panama Canal,
which has proved to be an enormous boon to the whole
world—remains legally in force;
Whereas the 1903 Treaty between the United States and
Panama grants the United States full sovereign rights
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over the Panama Canal and Canal Zone ‘‘in perpetuity’’,
and the United States Supreme Court has ruled (1907)
that the Canal Zone is indeed United States territory;
Whereas even the terms of the invalid Carter-Torrijos Neu-
trality Treaty have been violated, rendering that treaty
doubly void, in that Article V of the Neutrality Treaty
specifies use of defense sites by Panama only, but Pan-
ama is leasing defense sites to a partner of the merchant
marine arm of China’s People’s Liberation Army
(Hutchison Whampoa);
Whereas the President of the United States, in defiance of
both law and the national security and economic interests
of the United States, has proceeded, and is proceeding,
with the complete transfer of this vital, sovereign terri-
tory of the United States to Panama;
Whereas this transfer process is proceeding toward imminent
completion on December 31, 1999; and
Whereas treaties are legislative acts and, as officially noted
in Jefferson’s Manual and Rules of the House of Rep-
resentatives, ‘‘Treaties being declared equally with the
laws of the United States, to be the supreme law of the
land, it is understood that an act of the legislature alone
can declare them infringed and rescinded’’: Now, there-
fore, be it
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
That notice is given to the Government of Panama of the
decree of nullity of the 1977 Carter-Torrijos treaties, and,
further, that the United States recognizes the Hay-
•HJ 77 IH
Bunau-Varilla Treaty of 1903 has never been voided and
remains legally binding.
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