PANAMA. THE AMERICAN ENTERPRISE. United States Authority in Colon and Panama - The Price of the Concession - The Canal to be Neutral Forever Instructions Regarding the Inhabitants of the Zone - Attitude of the United States Towards Panama - A Futile Revolutionary Movement - The Commission Visits the Isthmus - The Plan of the Walker Commission - The Objections to the Commission - Wallace Resigns and Stevens Steps In The President's Address to the Consulting Engineers A Disappointing Conclusion - Consideration of the Rival Projects. The Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty was negotiated between the respective representatives of the United States and Panama in the autumn of 1903 and fully ratified February, 1904. The most important features of this convention are as follows: Article 1. "The United States guarantees and will maintain the independence of the Republic of Panama." Article 2. "The Republic of Panama grants to the United States in perpetuity the use, occupation and control of a zone of land, and land under water for the construction, maintenance, operation, sanitation and protection of said canal, of the width of ten miles, extending to the distance of five miles on each side of the centre line of the canal to be constructed; the said zone beginning in the Caribbean Sea three marine miles from mean low-water mark and extending to and across the Isthmus of Panama into the Pacific Ocean to a distance of three marine miles from mean low-water mark, with the proviso. that the cities of Panama and Colon and the harbors adjacent to said cities, which are included within the boundaries of the zone above described, shall not be included within this grant . . The Repub lic of Panama further grants in like manner to the United States in perpetuity all islands within the limits of the Zone above described and, in addition thereto, the group of small islands in the Bay of Panama, named Perico, Naos, Culebra and Flamenco." Article 3. "The Republic of Panama grants to the United States all the rights, power, and authority within the Zone mentioned and described in Article 2 of this agreement which the United States would possess and exercise if it were the sovereign of the territory within which said lands and waters are located, to the entire exclusion of the exercise by the Republic of Panama of any such sovereign rights, power or authority." Article 6 provides for compensation to private UNITED STATES AUTHORITY. 533 property owners, by the United States, for any damage to private property occasioned by the canal operations and for the assessment of such compensation by arbitration. UNITED STATES AUTHORITY IN COLON AND PANAMA. 66 Article 7. The Republic of Panama agrees that the cities of Panama and Colon shall comply in perpetuity with the sanitary ordinances, whether of a preventive or curative character, prescribed by the United States and, in case the Government of Panama is unable, or fails in its duty, to enforce this compliance by the cities of Panama and Colon with the sanitary ordinances of the United States, the Republic of Panama grants to the United States the right and authority to enforce the same. "The same right and authority are granted to the United States for the maintenance of public order in the cities of Panama and Colon and the territories and harbors adjacent thereto in case the Republic of Panama should not be, in the judgment of the United States, able to maintain such order." Provision is made in this article for the reimbursement of the United States for any outlay it may make, under the discretionary authority referred to above, in "works of sanitation, collection and disposition of sewage, and distribution of water, in the cities of Panama and Colon." |