The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-12-17
BOLSTERlNG UP THE ACT.
LOOMS BIackens Colombia to Excuse
the Coup d'Etat at Panama.
(By the Associated Press.)

| New York, Dec 15.-The conditions
which resulted in the recent establishment
of the recent Republic of Panama were
discussed tonight at the banquet of the
Quill Club, held at the Hotel Manhat
tan, by Francis B. Loomis, Assistant
Secretary of State of the United States
and NJ. Philippe Bunau-Varilla, Minister
for Panama Among those present was
President F'rissell, of the Hampton Insti
tute.
Assistant Secretary Loomis in present
ing his views on Panama and our rela.
tons with other Latin-American countries
said:
I'VE have not desired to annex Panama,
and we have not done so. The President
simply executed the will of the people
with due regard to international law and
rights. He was instructed by Congress to
secure a canal route on the Isthmus of
Panama, if possible. He waited until the
adjournment of the Colombian Congress
and gave the government of that country
every opportunity to ratify the treaty or
to propose some proper method looking to
the ratification OF new treaty and the
Colombian Congress, in utter bad faith,
rejected the treaty and adjourned"
Then the revolution occurred and the
President recognized the new republic.
The right of secession, Mr.. LOOMS said,
was expressly stipulated in some of the
Panama constitutions. Mr. LOOMS said
the administration had no apology to Of
fer for its course.
THE rejection of the treaty at Bogota,"
continued Mr.. Loomis, was an unfrendly
act, from the view point of international
law. Colombia appealed to us to enter in
to a treaty to build canal, the treaty
was negotiated with her in a most liberal
spirit on or part and was then rejected
by the Colombian government and Con
gress without debate. 1t occurred to GER
tain men in Bogota that the United States
could be made to pay $20,000,000 or $685.
900, 900 instead of so, 900 as has been
disclosed by recent published official cor
respondence, if the treaty were rejected
or no action taken upon it and the whole
matter postponed for another year, the
conces sion of the present French canal
company having expired by that time, the
renewal of that concession would be de-
clared invalid and all the rights, privi-
leges and work of the French canal com
pany be practically confiscated and dis
posed of to the United States for $40 .000,-
900 in addition to the ten millions as pro-
posed, and the annuity of a quarter of a
million. This was a radiant and alluring
prospect and the temptation proved too
strong.
This particular bit of canal history and
the possible consequences of the action
of the Colombian government in rejecting
the treaty have not been eXhaustively dis
cussed. If you will consider it carefully
you will see that out of the conditions
created by the failure of the Colombians
TO ratify the treaty and their deeply
grounded belief that they could invalidate
the renewal Of the concession of the
French company and sell that concession
to the United States for forty million of
dollars, out of these possibilities came one
of our strongest needs for prompt and
courageous action when the opportunity
was offered by the revolution in Panama
on November 3.
"If the Colombian Congress had declared
invalid the renewal of the French conces-
sion, which might have happened on the
isthmus, may safely assert without fear
of contradiction by any well informed per
sons, that the government of France
would not have stood serenely by and
witnessed the pillage of thousands of her
people through the act which Bogota poll
ticians devised for the looting of the
French company of $4,000, 900.
The moment that the cables flashed
from Bogota to Paris the astounding news
that the extension of the French conces-
sion was cancelled, French squadron
from Martinique would have borne down
upon the isthmus and perhaps landed ma
rines at Colon and sent them across the
isthmus to Panama and along the line OF
the canal TO protect the interests and
property of French citizens. There
would, in all probability, have been an
armed conflict between France and Colon
ba, or France at least would have felt
herself compelled to hold the isthmus for
a long period This would have wrought
INN ediately and poignantly upon the sensi-
bilities of the American people in respect
to the Monroe doctrine and we should no
doubt have found ourselves viewing
France with annoying apprehension. The
French warships might easily have been
followed by those of England and Hol-
land; and Panama, like the Balkan states,
might well have been expected to furnish
the spark to set half the world in flames"