The Triumphant Life of Theodore Roosevelt edited by J. Martin Miller

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 17
appointed. Assembling on September 3, 1903, and being pre-
sided over by the lord chief justice of England, it reached a
conclusion on October 20th, resulting in a complete victory for
the United States and sustaining every material contention of
our government.
Thus was confirmed the wisdom of President Roosevelt's
action, peacefully settling this irritating controversy, which, it
was believed by some, would eventually cause war between the
United States and Great Britain, and which certainly stood as
an obstacle to the maintenance of peaceful relations with
Canada.
The diplomatic complications which had for years stood in
the way of an interoceanic canal connecting the two great
oceans were finally disposed of during the last two Republican
administrations, and the practical work of constructing the
canal was commenced under the administration of President
Roosevelt.
A canal across the Isthmus, connecting the Atlantic with
the Pacific Ocean, in the interest of the commerce of the
world, has been the dream of the ages. F"or almost three-
quarters of a century an interoceanic canal has been a policy
of every party and almost of every administration.
It remained for the McKinley-Roosevelt administrations,
through the diplomacy of Secretary Hay, to successfully
negotiate the Hay-Pauncefote treaty with Great Britain, by
which the Clayton-Bulwer treaty was finally superseded and
the United States given authority to build a canal and assume
the responsibility of safeguarding and regulating its neutral
use by all the nations of the world on terms of equality.
The way was thus opened for the negotiation of a treaty
with one of the two governments which had sovereignty over