Morning journal and courier., 1889-02-25
THE PANAMA RESOLUTION.

The Majority Report on the Ednunds
 Panama Resolution VIII Present 1t
 to she House Early This Week, Ree-
 ommend1ng Its Adoption.
 WASHINGTON, Feb. 24-The majority re- port from the House committee on foreign affairs on the Edmunds Panama resolution, and recommending it's adoption, will be pre- sented to the House early this week.. The report is signed by Chairman McCreary and Representative Chipman, Democrats, and by Representatives Ksrchum, Phelps, Rockwell, Hit and Morrow, all of the Republican members of the committee. The majority in their report, made public tonight, after alluding to the fact that the joint resolution passed the Senate almost unanimously, there
 being but three votes against it, insist that it reafirms public policy that is of both na- tional and international importance; public policy that has been so intimately interwoven with the treaties and teachings, doctrines and necessities of the American people that it seems to have originated in the very earliest days of our republic. It is not the first nor the strongest resolution that has been introduced in Congress in supa port of the Monroe doctrine, and in proof of this they cite resolutions introduced by Senator Burnside in 1879, by Represen- tative Crapo in 1880, by Senator Morgan in 1881 and resolutions reported from the House committee on foreign affairs in the same year all opposing the construction of an inter-oceanic canal across Central America under the auspices of any foreign govern I ment; and all of which reassert the Monroe doctrine as 8 cardinal principle of our national policy. The pending joint resolu- I tion. the com mDittee says, is easily under- stood. It simply declares that the govern ! ment of the United States will look with ! serious concern and disapproval upon any ! connection of any European government with | the construction or control of either the ! Panama canal or the Nicaragua canal and will ! regard such connection or control as injurious to the rights and interests of the United \ States and as a menace to their welfare. The | construction or control of the Panama canal or the Nicaragua canal by any European \ government, the committee says, will cause \ the violation of the Monroe doctrine and be followed perhaps by serious and hostile dis | turbances.
 ! History shows that wherever governments \ put their money they soon follow with their l power and that the aim of the great nations | of Europe has been to take possession of the salient points and narrow straits of the world
 for the control of commerce and for aid in | time of War.
 | Concluding their argument in favor of the | adoption of the joint resolution the majority
 says:
 | If any European government should con- struct or assist in the construction of great
 public improvement in another country, the ! assertion of that power by the government can be followed by the right of defending | that improvement. Colombia and Nicaragua ! are both weak republican powers and they I would soon be forced to yield either by treaty | arrangements or concessions to the govern mental authority promoting the enterprise. A conflict of interests with either would ! r,oSk oartaiuIv OccQr and th6 weak mower
 would succumb to the greater power, and
 the ultimate result would be European
 domination in Panama or Nicaragua and per. haps an extension of the domination to other | republics If this Is allowed, we abandon the principles to which we have clung fol
 nearly seventy years and we surrender the | sacred principles which our fathers and oul
 forefathers maintained so successfully and SC
 periodically. We appreciate the friendship | which has always existed between France | and the United States, and we remember
 too with pride that France is republic
 but France may soon be an empire, and l after the canal is built controlling interest
 may be purchased by Great Britain or by l some other European power as was dont | after the completion of the Suez canal. W. l should not permit governmental control O
 ship canals in Central or in South Americ' l by European nations any more than WI l should permit more European colonization | in the western hemisphere.
 The one leads to the other. The declara
 ton of President Monroe in 1893 was notice l to the world of an American policy. It wa I announced at much more critical time thaI , the present and it's results were splendid ant , fsr-reaching We should not hesitate in thu
 most solemn and emphatic manner to re affirm, his grand declarations in manner ap plicsble to existing conditions and in ac , eordance with the development of events. |