Evening star., 1901-10-18
Possible Significance Of M. Hutin's
Visit Here.
OPPOSITION TO ANY PURCHASE
Strong Language of Senate Com
mittee's Report.
RAILWAY MONOPOLY


litical and congressional circles. NJ. HUI
tins appearance at time when there is
revival of discussion of isthmian canal
projects. consequent upon the forthcoming
submission of a new canal treaty with
Great Britain, is regarded in some quarters
as possibly significant. The question is be-
ing asked whether NJ. Hutin will present
definite proposition for the transfer of the
Panama project.
The answer to this question is made more
interesting from the fact that the allega-
tion was explicitly made in an official re-
port of Congress last session that the Pan
anna Canal Company. which NJ Hutin rep
resents is engaged in frustrating and pre-
venting the accomplishment of the isthmian
canal project with which the American
Congress has been dealing for many years.
This. it was charged, is in the interest of
transcontinental railway monopoly, with
which the canal company was alleged to be
associated
In the light of past events. therefore. the
persons who are interested in the inter-
oceanic waterway plan are asking whether
the Panama Canal Company is getting
ready to again expose itself to charges OF
playing the dog in the manger, or IT, In
deed. the obstacles heretofore considered
to be in the way of selling the Panama
canal to this government have been over
come and a genuine proposition is at hand
The proposition made by the Panama
Canal Company to this government in the
last session of Congress was willingness
to transfer its concessions to company
chartered in some state and to extend TO
the United States such an interest in the
stock of the state corporation as would not
violate the concessions from Colombia.
Senate Committees Adverse Report.
The Senate committee on interoceanic
canals in the last session made a report
to the Senate upon this subject, presented
by Senator Morgan of Alabama chairman
OF the committee. That report said:
THE acceptance of stock and the appoint
ment of a part of the directors in such
company by the United States would find
no liberation in the Constitution. 1t would
invite conflict with other powers and would
sink the honor and dignity of the govern
ment in a common depravity-
why the agents of the New Panama
Canal Company have found it to their in
terest to approach the President and COM
mittee of Congress with overtures so impos-
sible of acceptance is left to conjecture
only. When the fact is recurred to that
an agreement was made with the Panama
Railroad Company, and all other transcon-
tinental railroads having terminals at the
Pacific ocean, as early as February L. 1878,
which agreements, with slight notifications.
exist at the present time, and are intended
to monopOliZe the vast amount of freightS
between the oceans that border America, as
well other great lines of ships, for the
benefit of those railroads, the conclusion
naturally follows that to delay action by the
United States in the construction of a COM
petitive waterway through Nicaragua is the
apparent motive for the peculiar attitude
and conduct of the Panama Canal Company
conduct that was insolent toward the
President and indecorous and reproach-
full to the House of Representatives,
as this committee has pointed out in previ-
reports. This line of action is only a
reproduction in different form of the same
effort by the old Panama Canal Company
to prevent the construction of a canal
through Nicaragua under the auspices of
the United States. That effort was exposed
and denounced by select committee of the
House of Representatives of which House
committee Mr.. Fellows Of Arkansas was
chairman.
Agreement for Trade Monopoly.
THE facts stated in the report of Mr..
Fellows are further established by the
sworn statement of Coils P. Huntington
in his examination before the Senate COM
mittee on Pacific railroads, February Is,
1885, which is appended to this report In
that deposition Mr.. Huntington furnishes
copy of the agreement between all the
transcontinental railroads in North and
Central America, except the railroad at
Tehuantepac, for the monopoly of trans
portation, and in his statement he gives re-
luctantly history of the monopoly Gre
ated by agreement with the Panama Canal
and Railroad companies covering the same
trade and also the entire transportation
across the 1sthmus of Darien to and from
all the western coasts of South America.
The oppressive use that has been made CT
the Panama railroad will be increased by
the canal If 1t Is ever constructed and will
lnnlct fatal damage upon our commerce"
The report insists 1T Is beyond dispute
that these legal diplomatic and treaty bar
riers (set out at length) forbid the United
States from any participation with the New
Panama Canal Company in the ownership
OF their canal and railroad"
we nave been carefully jealous" con-
tinues the report, "of any possible en-
croachment Of France in concert with CO.
iombia or otherwise. The celebrated dec
iaration OF Mr. Evarts that any canal
through the isthmus must be under Amer
lean CONTROL that is so gladly supported
oy our people. originated in our watchful-
ness OF the operations of the French in con-
uoI OF the Panama canal operations
To abandon this high national ground
70 form disreputable partnership under
tae New Jersey charter of the Panama
Canal Company of America with the rro-
moters and spectators who are irving to
unload that canal property on the United
States. would be no offense to the people
and dishonor to the government
The report, after dealing with dis
crepancies in the estimates of the value of
the Panama canal, made at different
times. says:
"If we take over these assets at those
estimates. the canal will cost the United
States S256.373,25S. an excess above the es-
timated Tin. ate i,- cost of the Nicaragua canal of
sOo.eb3.2o3, still leaving the Panama rail-
road valued at S7.OO0,OOO) in the owner
ship Of the Panama Canal Co.
Agreement with Pacific Mail Co.
The Panama Canal Company controls
and claims to own the Panama railroad,
and as early as 1873 it entered into an
agreement with the Pacific Mail Steamship
Company by which the latter was given
the exclusive control of freights on the
oceans that were hauled over the Panama
railroad. This agreement was enlarged at
later date so as to include every trans
continental railroad that has its terminals
on t. North American coast OF the Pa
ctfic. and this monopoly still exists.
1T converts the Panama railroad into an
employed servant of the steamship lines
and the railroads that own and control
them.
IF the Panama canal Is ever constructed
under the concessions of Colombia now ex-
listing. this monopolistic arrangement will
be extended so to include that canal and
the commerce between the oceans across
this continent will be controlled by that
combination in which the Panama Canal
company will be party and monopolists
Will own the stock
The evident purpose is to keep the