against us every nation whose fleet is larger than our own. One
prime reason for fortifying our great seaports, is to unfetter
our fleet, to release it for offensive purposes; and the proposed
canal would fetter it again, for our fleet would have to watch
it, and therefore do the work which a fort should do; and what it
could do much better.

'Secondly, as to the Monroe Doctrine. If we invite foreign powers
to a joint ownership, a joint guarantee, of what so vitally
concerns us but a little way from our borders, how can we
possibly object to similar joint action, say in Southern Brazil
or Argentina, where our interests are so much less evident? If
Germany has the same right that we have in the canal across
Central America, why not in the partition of any part of Southern
America? To my mind, we should consistently refuse to all
European powers the right to control in any shape, any territory
in the Western Hemisphere which they do not already hold.

'As for existing treaties--I do not admit the "dead hand" of the
treaty making power in the past. A treaty can always be honorably
abrogated--though it must never be abrogated in dishonest
fashion.'*

* W. R. Thayer: John Hay, II, 339-41.


Fortunately, Lord Salisbury, the British Prime Minister, remained
benevolently disposed towards the Isthmian Canal, and in the
following year he consented to take up the subject again. A new
treaty embodying the American amendments and the British