tolls imposed upon vessels passing through the canal, we cannot and we ought not to overlook the understanding of those who negotiated the treaty as to the intent and effect of the rules which they framed. As to the nature of the understanding we have direct testimony. Mr. Henry White, who first laid before the British Government the desire of the United States to enter into negotiations for the supersession of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, has stated that Lord Salisbury expressed to him the entire willingness of England to remove all obstacles which the Clayton-Bulwer treaty put in the way of the construction of the canal, and desired only to maintain equality of tolls imposed upon all vessels, including those of the United States. Mr. Choate, who, as I have said, completed the negotiations which resulted in the second Hay-Pauncefote treaty, has publicly stated that the understanding at that time of both parties was the same as that given by Mr. White. The only other American concerned in the actual negotiation of the treaty was the late Mr. Hay, at that time Secretary of State. I know that Mr. Hay's view was the same as that of Mr. Choate and Mr. White. It is therefore clear on the testimony of our three negotiators that the negotiations as they were begun and as they were completed in the second Hay-Pauncefote treaty proceeded on the clear understanding that there was to be no discrimination in the tolls imposed as between the vessels of any nation, including the vessels of the United States.

"Whether we shall insist upon giving to our ships two or three millions of dollars in a disputed way, is in

my conception, a very small question compared to the larger issues which are here involved. When the year 1909 opened, the United States occupied a higher and stronger position among the nations of the earth than at any period in our history. Never before had we possessed such an influence in international affairs, and that influence had been used beneficently and for the world's peace in two conspicuous instances at Portsmouth and at Algeciras. Never before had our relations with the various States of Central and South America been so good. It seemed as if the shadow of suspicion which, owing to our dominant and at times domineering power, had darkened and chilled our relations with the people of Latin America, had at last been lifted. A world power we had been for many long years, but we had at last become a world power in the finer sense, a power whose active participation and beneficent influence were recognized and desired by other nations in those great questions which concerned the welfare and happiness of all mankind. This great position and this commanding influence have been largely lost. I have no desire to open up,old questions or to trace the steps by which this result has come to pass, still less to indulge in criticism or censure upon anyone. I merely note the fact. I am not in the councils of the President of the United States, but I believe that during the past year the present position of the United States in its foreign relations has become very apparent to him, as it has to other responsible and reflecting men, and with this appreciation of our present position has come the earnest wish to retrace some of our steps, at least, and to regain, so far as possible, the

high plane which we formerly occupied. It would be an obvious impropriety to point out the specific conditions of our present relations with the various nations, both in the Old World and the New; it is enough to note the fact that we are regarded by other nations with distrust and in some cases with dislike. Rightly or wrongly, they have come to believe that we are not to be trusted; that we make our international relations the sport of politics and treat them as if they were in no wise different from questions of domestic legislation.

"The President has written the history of his country, and it would be strange, indeed, if he did not desire to maintain our tradition of good faith and fair dealing with the other nations of the earth. It is not well for any country, no matter how powerful, to be an outlaw among the nations. Not so many years ago there were people in England who used to speak with pride of her 'splendid isolation,' but they soon found out that while isolation might be splendid, it was in the highest degree undesirable. Since those days England has been making every effort to escape from her 'splendid isolation,' as has been conspicuously shown by the alliance with Japan and the entente with France.

"I suppose that at this moment in the midst of the adroitly stimulated passions raised against the President's recommendation that we should repeal the toll-exemption it will be thought very poor spirited and even truckling— I believe that is the accepted word-to suggest that in deciding this question we should take into consideration the opinions of other nations. Nevertheless, I consider

this a very important element in any decision which I may reach, and I am encouraged to believe that I am right in so thinking, because I have the warrant and authority of the author of the Declaration of Independence. When Jefferson framed that great instrument he declared that the impelling reason for making the Declaration was ‘a decent respect to the opinions of mankind.' That decent respect to the opinions of mankind ought never to be forgotten in the decision of any question which involves the relations of our own country with the other nations of the earth.

"The long delay in the ratification by the Senate of the treaties renewing the arbitration treaties of 1908 produced a widespread feeling among other nations that our championship of the principle of arbitration and our loud boasts of our devotion to the cause of peace were the merest hypocrisy, because we seemed ready to abandon the cause of arbitration when it looked as if our treaties might bring us to the arbitration of questions which we did not desire to have decided by an impartial tribunal. The President renewed the arbitration treaties, and finally, after a delay which, as I have said, aroused unpleasant suspicions, those which have been sent to the Senate have been ratified. This was the President's first step, as I look at it, in his effort to restore the influence and reputation of the United States, which he had found to be impaired. His second step is his recommendation of the repeal of the toll-exemption clause of the canal act. I speak wholly without authority, but I believe that he must have thought that our insistence upon a contested interpretation of a treaty and upon a disputed method of relieving our vessels from the

payment of tolls has injured us in the opinion of civilized mankind, and that he believes that the object sought in no way justifies the results which will necessarily follow in the attitude of other nations toward us.

"He must be, I believe, satisfied, as I am satisfied, that other nations will hesitate long before they will enter upon treaties with a country which insists on deciding all disputed points in treaties in its own favor by a majority vote of Congress. It would not surprise me to learn that the President is of opinion that such disputed points ought to be settled as we have settled them in the past, with which, as a historian, he is familiar, either by negotiation or by arbitration and not by our own votes without appeal and open only to the arbitrament of the sword.

"We obtained by the passage of the toll-exemption clause no legal rights which we did not already possess; we waive none by its repeal. All we have we retain, for the law is merely our own statute for the regulation of the terms upon which the canal shall be used. The larger question which is raised by the toll-exemption, however, has a purely international character, and that we ought to decide, now and in the future, not on considerations of pecuniary profit or momentary political exigencies, but on the broad grounds which I have indicated. We should determine what is right without fear and without favor.

"For these reasons which I have set forth, although I believe we have the right to exempt our vessels from tolls, I have come to the conclusion that this clause in the canal act, which I have opposed from the outset, ought to be