The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1902-12-12

tOncna VIII leau pTObdDlS III
n short time to the ratitica
ton of the Panama canal
treaty 1t is believed at Washington
that the final draft of the document
will be completed Immediately and that
it can be presented to the senate in Il
few days. All is we'll that ends well.
The Colombian government had possibly
no intention of permitting defeat of the
treaty. At the same time it was very
natural for the people of this country
to presume that Minister Concha rep
resented the sentiments of his govern
ment during the negotiations. Ministers
engaged in such delicate and important
duties usually do.
Concha appears to be Il fuSsy, egotis-
teal cantankerous individual, who had
no very friendly feeling toward the
United States; one of those men who
estimate their own importance by the
magnitude and delicacy of the transac-
ton in which they are unfortunately
temporarily engaged. He seemed to
take the presence of the American ma
rines in the isthmus as Il personal af-
front, and demanded from Secretary
Hay guarantees which it was as i'm
possible for us to give as it would be
disastrous for his own country to re-
ceive.
What we demand in reality ana are
about to receive is the irrevocable pos
session of the strip of land through
which the canal is to be built. in addi-
ton to such a territorial margin as
either side of the waterway as will
make its efficient supervision, policing
and maintenance of the cut as easy and
untrammeled as possible. Nothing less
can satisfy the engineering eXigencies
and political conditions under which
the canal is to be built and taken out.
We have demanded ana require nothing
more. The canal should prove the in
dustrial redemption of Colombia. 1t
will be her own fault or the fault of the
people if it does not. While we hold
the canal the territorial integrity OF
Colombia is assured from aggression
from the outside, although we cannot
save her from herself, from that inter-
necne strife which is the curse of the
Latin republics.
Now that the ratification of the Pam
anna treaty is in sight, we shall prob
ably hear little more of the mighty pro-
ject until the work actually begins. Per-
haps it is not impertinent at the present
moment to inquire why DeLesSeps
failed The engineering of climatic diff
s.I,
anna We're incomparably greater than
those that confronted him in the 18TH
mus of SueZ. But the difference in OBJ
stacles that stood in his way in Europe
and Africa was not so great that it
should have meant an unqualified sue
igated failure in the other Nor did
it lie in the age OF the great engineer
when he began his Panama work. De
Lesseps, it is true, was an old man, but
no one has charged that he was not as
mentally vigorous as he was twenty
years before. The truth is the failure
of the Panama canal in the hands of
DeLesseps was due almost entirely to
moral causes and that these eliminated
in all their hideous infamy on The 18TH
mus itself. The financial and moral
corruption of the Frenchmen who We're
associated with DeLesseps only serious
ly began to corrode Partisan political
and speculative life when it was real
lied that DeLesseps would not live to
carry out the colossal task to which
he had set his genius The failure of
the scheme began and ended on the
isthmus Of Panama itself. If we are 10
safeguard against repetition of these
conditions, we must begin by prevent
ing the possibility of recurrence of the
strom of vice and iniquity.
There can be no question that the
physical conditions of the isthmus are
very bad and can be very little inn
proved physically until the canal is
built But when to these are added
the moral miasma which arises from
the concentration of the dregs of West
Indian and Latin American humanity,
equally infamous with the dregs of the
gambling dens and brothels on this con-
tinent ana from Europe, the combina-
tion becomes, indeed, formidable, 1t
is unfortunately fact that white labor
cannot be engaged TO any great extent
in the actual work of eAcayating. but
the negro is quite amenable To disoip-
line, if he sees that discipline is meant
TO be enforced. We cannot. of course,
prevent the authorities at Colon on Pan
anna or on the banks of the Charges
river from giving shelter to the repre-
sentative scoundrellsm of the globe.
But we can do great deal to prevent
it manifesting itself along the line of
the canal or i'm any way facilitating
rascallty in its construction. If negro