President Theodore Roosevelt oversaw the realization of a long-term United States goal—a trans-isthmian canal. Throughout the 1800s, American and British leaders and businessmen wanted to ship goods quickly and cheaply between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
Schematic of Panama Canal
To that end, in 1850 the United States and Great Britain negotiated the
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty to reign in rivalry over a proposed canal through the
Central American Republic of Nicaragua. The Anglo-American canal, however, never
went beyond the planning stages. French attempts to build a canal through Panama
(province of Colombia) advanced further. Led by Ferdinand de Lesseps—the builder
of the Suez Canal in Egypt—the French began excavating in 1880. Malaria, yellow
fever, and other tropical diseases conspired against the de Lesseps campaign and
after 9 years and a loss of approximately 20,000 lives, the French attempt went
bankrupt. In spite of such setbacks, American interest in a canal continued
unabated. The Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1901 abrogated the earlier Clayton-Bulwer
Treaty and licensed the United States to build and manage its own canal.
Following heated debate over the location of the proposed canal, on June 19,
1902, the U.S. Senate voted in favor of building the canal through Panama.
Within 6 months, Secretary of State John Hay signed a
treaty with Colombian Foreign Minister Tomás Herrán to build the new canal. The
financial terms were unacceptable to Colombia’s congress, and it rejected the
offer.
Philippe Bunau-Varilla
President Roosevelt responded by dispatching U.S. warships to Panama City (on the
Pacific) and Colón (on the Atlantic) in support of Panamanian independence.
Colombian troops were unable to negotiate the jungles of the Darien Strait and
Panama declared independence on November 3, 1903. The newly declared Republic of
Panama immediately named Philippe Bunau-Varilla (a French engineer who had been
involved in the earlier de Lesseps canal attempt) as Envoy Extraordinary and
Minister Plenipotentiary. In his new role, Bunau-Varilla negotiated the
Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty of 1903, which provided the United States with a
10-mile wide strip of land for the canal, a one-time $10 million payment to
Panama, and an annual annuity of $250,000. The United States also agreed to
guarantee the independence of Panama. Completed in 1914, the Panama Canal
symbolized U.S. technological prowess and economic power. Although U.S. control
of the canal eventually became an irritant to U.S.-Panamanian relations, at the
time it was heralded as a major foreign policy achievement.