should prescribe as one of the conditions on which she would cease to make war that we acknowledge having committed plainly and wantonly a violation of this treaty. Why, the whole civilized world would protest and declare it was a wanton, cruel, unjustifiable abuse of victory in battle. Yet here we are asked by our own President voluntarily to make that confession of dishonor, disloyalty, and falsehood. Of course, if the wrong has actually been done, there is but one thing for an honest man or an honest nation to do, and that is to acknowledge it, and if the wrong has resulted in injury to make adequate reparation. But I ask you to remember, Senators, that a wrong confessed, even though reparation be made for it and it be forgiven, still remains a wrong committed. Though punitive consequences be avoided, the wrongdoer can never hold the same position as one whose character had never been stained by perpetration of wrong.

Now, this country has established the highest reputation ever achieved by a nation for strict observance of treaties. Indeed, its record has been scrupulous, chivalric, almost quixotic for strict compliance with its treaty obligations during its existence of a century and a quarter. That glorious history we are now asked to becloud by confessing ourselves guilty of wanton, deliberate disregard of & plain obligation. Still if we have done this wrong, I repeat, there is nothing to do but acknowledge it and make all the reparation in our power. We must indeed hang our heads in shame for a wrong we are driven to confess, but we need not hang them so long or so low for an offense that is acknowledged and repented as for one that is continued and unatoned.

But have we violated any treaty or any promise or any covenant embodied in a treaty? I deny it. In the first place even on the conception of our relationship to the Canal Zone which evidently underlies the questions that I overheard to-day put by Senator Simmons, I deny that there is any treaty with England subsisting to-day which in the domain of law or morals could restrict our sovereignty over this territory.

Mr. Chairman, I submit the history of nations justifies us in claiming that no treaty made while the Canal Zone was alien territtory could affect us after that territory had become ours. The treaty we have made was in reference to a canal (I am speaking of the last Hay-Pauncefote treaty) to be constructed on alien territory. That territory has since been annexed. It is now territory of the United States. I say that by every principle of international law annexation of that territory terminated every treaty we may have made affecting it. Protection of the Isthmian Canal while it remained an enterprise to be prosecuted in alien territory was something this sovereignty might afford to undertake jointly with other sovereignties. The conditions under which that protection would be extended might properly perhaps be the subject of a treaty between them. But after we had acquired the territory itself and it had become our own, we can submit to no limitations upon our control of it without abdicating our sovereignty. Let me put to Senator Simmons this question-I hope the Senator will excuse me for addressing him personally.

Senator SIMMONS. That is all right.

Mr. COCKRAN. His questions were so full and so pointed to-day that I take it they embodied the views held by all supporters of this

measure.

Let me put this question: That territory surely is as much ours now as Alaska, as California, and as Idaho. That waterway, that canal, is therefore as much our waterway as the East River, the Mississippi, or the Ohio River. That surely the Senator will concede. Suppose this isthmian territory became very populous, as I think it will, suppose it became the abode of teeming millions-that 2,000,000 3,000,000, four, or five million white men of our own race should occupy it is there any reason why we should not admit it as a State? And if we admit it as a State into the Union, how could we continue partitioning our authority over it, dividing it with any other country-clipping here and extending there the sovereignty of that State once it had been admitted into our family of S ates?

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, there never has been an instance in which a country took over territory where absorption of the territory into that sovereignty did not extinguish all prior treaties in reference to it. We have repeatedly acquired territory ourselves. Never have we acknowledged that any prior treaty affecting it could govern our sovereignty over it after it had been acquired.

Surely everybody here is familiar with the conditions under which Louisiana was annexed. Yet Louisiana had been subject of a treaty between the King of Spain and this country made only seven years before the purchase by us of that territory from France. Did anybody ever pretend that our control over Louisiana was limited or affected by our treaty of 1795 with the King of Spain?

Louisiana, as you know, was originally a French territory, settled by the French. It was ceded in 1762 to Spain by a secret treaty which was not published until 1769. About 1763, I think, a treaty was made between France and Spain on the one hand and England and Portugal on the other, fixing the eastern boundary of Louisiana at the center of the Mississippi River from its source down to the thirty-first parallel of north latitude, from which point it ran at right angles eastward along that parallel to the sea. This left both banks of the Mississippi River from about its junction with the Red River down to its mouth Spanish territory. When we established our independence Great Britain, by the treaty of 1783, yielded to us all territory east of the Mississippi River between the thirty-first parallel of north latitude and the Canadian border. This left the United States without access to the Gulf of Mexico. There was continual irritation with the King of Spain over the right of American producers on lands watered by the Mississippi to get their commodities to the Gulf. Finally, in 1795, I think, a treaty was made called the treaty of "Friendship, limits, and navigation," as I recall it-I am speaking from memory --by which it was provided that for three years from the date of its ratification American merchants should have the right to deposit their merchandise in the Island of Orleans at a place to be fixed by the Spanish intendente on the same terms as residents of the territory. It was also provided that if at the end of three years the place of deposit originally fixed was found to be inconvenient, the King of Spain would provide for the benefit of American shippers an equivalent establishment.

In 1800, as we all know, Spain ceded Louisiana back to France. That cession was also by secret treaty. In 1802 Spanish officers still remained in control of the territory, and the Spanish intendente by proclamation announced that the period to which the right of deposit was restricted having expired and the Spanish King, having fixed no other place of deposit, he would not permit American merchants any longer to enter the port of Orleans and deposit their merchandise there on equal terms with the residents. At once the spirit of this country rose in violent protest. Mr. Ross, a Senator from Pennsyl vania, offered a resolution in the Senate directing the President to take forcible possession of Orleans, authorizing him for that purpose to use the armed forces of the United States and appropriating $5,000,000 to meet expenses. The President, Thomas Jefferson, while recognizing the necessity of preserving for American merchants free access to the gulf did not believe armed measures would be necessary to establish that right. He felt convinced that by negotiations he could secure the Island of Orleans, but he considered it highly important that his intentions and purposes in this respect should not be disclosed. Accordingly he suggested to Congress through supporters of his administration that an appropriation of $3,000,000 be made, nominally for improvement of the diplomatic service of the United States, but which it was to be understood he would employ to acquire by purchase the Island of Orleans. The measure was considered and passed by the House behind closed doors, the only instance so far as I know in which a law was passed in secret session by that body. This bill was sent over to the Senate by a special committee consisting of two members (I think their names were Bayard and Nicholson), with a message stating that it had been passed in compliance with the wish of the President in that form, while really intended to equip him with means to acquire the Island of Orleans. It was passed in the Senate without alteration. The sov ereignty of the territory being doubtful, Mr. Jefferson appointed two commissions, one to France and one to Spain, each charged with the same mission. It was soon found to be French territory, and Napoleon Bonaparte, then first consul, proved ready to negotiate for the sale, not of Orleans but the whole territory of Louisiana.

You are all familiar with this history. You all know how, in 1803, the whole of Louisiana became territory of the United States. Now, that treaty of 1795 with Spain, unless it was abrogated by the mere fact of our purchase, is still in existence. It has never been abrogated and superseded in terms by any subsequent treaty. According to the contention made here in support of this measure, after Louisiana had become United States territory, the Spanish King was still bound to designate a place in the Island of Orleans on which commodities coming from other States of the Union could be deposited and American merchants had no right to deposit their wares anywhere else in that territory. Nay, according to this view of international obligations that treaty exists now and free admission of commodities from other States of the Union to the Island of Orleans is without sanction under its provisions and therefore without justification.

Would such a proposal be considered for a second by this Nation? Would it be advanced by any nation governed by a sovereign who was sane? If we are to consider treaties between sovereigns merely

as contracts between individuals, our treaty with France, under which we acquired Louisiana, could not affect rights of the Spanish King in that territory which we had acknowledged by a previous treaty, for he was not a party to our agreement with France. But treaties being agreements between sovereigns are on a totally different footing. They are determined by events. Absorption of the territory affected by our treaty with the King of Spain ended the treaty itself, and this not by our assertion but by the consent of all men.

Mr. Chairman, you can not in the nature of things have sovereignty that is limited. We were given sovereignty over the Canal Zone by the terms of our treaty with Panama, and we have entered into possession of the territory. That carries with it the abrogation of every treaty agreement we may have made with any power concerning that territory.

Of course, it will be said that the Hay-Pauncefote treaty contains a clause which specifically provides that any alteration in the political relationship or situation of the territory through which the canal might pass should not affect its validity. But this manifestly, in the very nature of things, must have referred (and it must have been so understood by the Senate) to a cession of this territory from Colombia, which was then its sovereign, to some other power other than either one of those signing the treaty. If it had been intended that this treaty should remain effective even though the canal territory were annexed by the United States, that limitation so inconsistent with the usages of nations must have been expressed in terms that were unmistakable. It can not be read into a treaty by any such forced system of construction as courts of law sometimes permit themselves in construing the statutes of a country.

Let us proceed a step further. We have seen that in the very nature of things sovereignty can not be conditioned; it must be absolute. It can not be limited by treaty or in any other way, and still remain sovereignty. We have also seen that sovereignty must prevail over every territory within the dominion of civilization. If sovereignty of this Canal Zone does not lie with us, it must lie somewhere else. I do not believe anyone will pretend there is a sovereignty over that zone superior to ours, and if there be none superior there can be none other than ours.

Now, this sovereignty in the very nature of things being absolute, I submit it is at variance alike with patriotism and prudence to impeach the method of its establishment on moral grounds. For, while sovereignty being authority, power, dominion over territory is not conditioned or limited by any law, none the less its security may very largely be affected by the conditions under which it was established, and therefore, by the moral weight it exercises. Every Sovereignty appeals to the Christian moral law, whenever it is in difficulty with another, which shows how important it is that the morals governing our public policy should not be lightly impeached or impugned by statesmen to whom control of our Government is entrusted. If our sovereignty over the Canal Zone was immoral in its establishment, some other power must have been unjustly deprived by us of sovereignty. That power could still claim to be sovereign de jure. Though we may be strong enough to keep him out of this territory, though we may remain the de facto sovereign

of it, yet if he have a moral right to it the time may come when that moral right will find agencies strong enough to enforce it even against us.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Do you claim we would be the sovereign of the Panama Zone if we stopped operating the canal then? Mr. COCKRAN. Absolutely.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Under what language of the treaty?
Mr. COCKRAN. Because we are actually sovereigns.

Senator BRANDEGEE. The treaty gave us the right to use the land in perpetuity for the purpose of operating the canal, did it not? Mr. COCKRAN. Senator, if you had been here when I began, you would have understood my contention as to that. I have endeavored to make a distinction between attorneyship and statesmanshipbetween a contract, say, for building a canal or a letting in tenancy and a treaty between sovereignties. We are sovereign over that Canal Zone. Nobody, I think, disputes that. That sovereignty can not be suspended. It must exist somewhere. When the treaty with Panama declared us sovereign, and when by possession we became actually sovereign, that fact carried everything that constitutes sovereignty with it. It could not carry a limitation on our title, for if it did the sovereignty must lie somewhere else. If we are not sovereigns there, but trustees, as it is contended, then I submit any power strong enough to turn us out would be justified morally as well as legally in bidding us go. We would have no moral right to object because discharging a trustee from his trust is not doing him an injury at all, but a benefit. It is taking a burden off his shoulders. The moment you recognize that relationship of trustee and cestuis que trust, you impeach the justice of our title. You justify any stronger force in throwing us out.

Senator BRANDEGEE. But the treaties did not in terms convey sovereignty.

Mr. COCKRAN. The treaty in terms conveyed sovereignty, because it conveyed the land absolutely to a sovereign. Sovereignty is not a thing to be conveyed in words. Sovereignty depends not on morals, but on facts. It may originate in the darkest crime and yet be unquestioned sovereignty. There may be a de facto and a de jure sovereignty. That is to say, there may be actual sovereignty and a right to sovereignty. Actual sovereignty must be absolute. A man may shoot the de jure sovereign sitting in his chair and then, tak ing the body and throwing it out of the window, sit down in that chair made vacant by murder. And if by that act or any other he can establish his power over the territory, he becomes sovereign de facto. He is the actual sovereign, and while he remains sovereign he can not be limited in the exercise of his sovereignty.

Senator BRANDEGEE. But the treaty refrains scrupulously from conveying

Mr. COCKRAN. Then where is the sovereignty, may I ask? Senator BRANDEGEE. The treaty conveys all the rights that we would have if we were sovereigns for the purpose of operating the canal. I do not mean to interrupt you, Mr. Cockran.

Mr. COCKRAN. I have discussed at some length this question, and I have endeavored to show any attempt to read the treaty that way involves a contradiction in terms. You can not have a qualified sovereignty, because sovereignty in the nature of things is uncondi