The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-12-13
SENATOR MORGAN SAYS FAILURE
TO BUILD CANAL WOULD CAUSE
NATIONAL DESPAIR
FAVORABLE REPORT ON BILL
Accompanied by Strong Argument
for Construction of an Isthmian
Waterway Controlled by
United States
SOURCE OF THE OPPOSITION

WASHINGTON, Dec. 12-The senate
committee on isthmian canals today au-
thorized a favorable report on Senator
Morgans bill providing for the acquisition
from Nicaragua and Costa Rica or the
right of way via the Nicaragua route.
Senator Morgan later presented this reSo-
luton to the senate, accompanying the
return of the bill with voluminous re-
port upon the general subject of a canal
across the isthmus. The introductory
pages of the report contain general re-
view of the Importance OF the construc-
ton of an isthmian canal, and in the Sec
ond paragraph of the report it is declared
that the failure to accomplish this would
create a feeling of national despair.
Contending for the Importance of the
enterprise, Senator Morgan urges that
no nation, nor any combination of private
interests, can have any right to prevent
it's consummation. '"There remains" he
says, but the one barrier to the union
of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and
no one nation has the right to declare
that it never Eshall be removed except
with its consent He attributes the fail
ure to construct the canal in the past to
the attitude of other nations, saying for
the past fifty years the power and infiu-
ence of the British government, aided
by combinations in the United States and
France, has defeated all efforts to open an
American canal"
Where the Opposition Lies.
Continuing in this line he says: THAT
antagoniSm which was an imperial policy
of Great Britain in the beginning, has
become a plan for gathering wealth by
levying tolls upon the commerce OF
America, and its-strength of purpose will
Increase until some more powerful and
ft1cf ~ aI1.aN
to relax its grasp and permit us to take
care of our own country. The combina-
tions at home and in France that nave
assisted in suppressing the demands of
our industrial classes for a canal to con-
meet the great oceans are chiefly the
transcontinental railways in Canada and
in Panama, and those in the United States
eight great corporations that now con-
troll almost the entire transportation serv-
ice between the oceans that wash the
coasts Of the Western hemisphere"
In further discussing the attitude Of
Great Britain, Senator Morgan says:
''The scope and purpose of the Clayton
Bulwer treaty, as 1t was declared by Lord
John Russell. made it the instrument of
injustice and repression to Nicaragua,
Costa Rica and other Central American
states that has deprived them and all
Chrtstendom of the benefits of an Ameri-
Can HlleTOcedIlC Cdlfdl IOr more lndn q
half century,"
Must Open Nfcaraguan Gateway.
He contends that Great Britain's pol
icy from the beginning was simply a
policy Of delay and that both powers
have abandoned the policy of the Clayton
Bulwer treaty. of which, he declares,
nothing remains "but an empty diplomatic
technically that must yield to the rea-
sonable demands of the United States,
Nicaragua and Costa Rica, for their own
safety and prosperity, and to the de-
mands of the world for gateway in Mic
aragua to correspond with that opened
at Suez.''
The major portion Of the report was
made before the new Hay-Pauncefote
treaty had been promulgated but in an
appendix the following reference is made
to that treaty:
eff two-thirds Of the senate shall con-
cur with the government Of Great Britain
in establishing an effective basis on which
a canal for ships through the American
isthmus shall be operated, for the Sc
curity and benefit of all nations, such
agreement may be considered an adyanc-
ed step in a true civilization, honorable
to both governments and rich in blessings
to mankind.
"It is new alignment as to the rights,
privileges and powers Of the United
States, touching the ownership and con-
troll of an isthmian canal, based on the
general principle of the freedom and neu-
trality of such canal that Is declared
in the Clayton-Bulwer treaty and is in ac-
cord with our well established national
policy"