Theodore Rex - Edmund Morris [179]
The Secretary was unwontedly formal when Bunau-Varilla presented himself. “I have requested Your Excellency to be so good as to keep this appointment in order to sign, if it is agreeable to Your Excellency, the Treaty which will permit the construction of the Interoceanic Canal.” He produced two beautifully typed copies, and waved aside “an insignificant question of terminology” in article 2. “If Your Excellency agrees to it, the Treaty will now be read, and we will then sign it.”
Conscious that Dr. Amador might at any minute knock on Hay’s door, Bunau-Varilla was quite willing to forgo the reading. He had not thought to bring a seal, so the Secretary offered him a choice of sealing rings. Bunau-Varilla chose one embossed with the Hay coat of arms. The clock stood at 6:40 P.M. Pens scratched across parchment. Wax melted on silk. Two oceans brimmed closer, ready to spill.
BUNAU-VARILLA WAS at Sixth Street Station three hours later to greet the diplomatic delegation. “The Republic of Panama is henceforth under the protection of the United States,” he announced as Dr. Amador stepped down, followed by Pablo Arosamena and Federico Boyd. “I have just signed the canal treaty.”
Amador reeled with shock. Bunau-Varilla felt obliged to support him. “Cherish no illusion, Mr. Boyd, the negotiations are closed.”
THANKSGIVING APPROACHED WITH lowering skies and shortening days. But Capitol Hill was lit up again, weeks earlier than usual. The Fifty-eighth Congress had convened in special session, at Roosevelt’s request.
That looked like the extent of its obedience, at least until its regular session began in December. The dragging, eighteen-month-old question of Cuban reciprocity, incredibly not yet resolved by last March’s treaty approval, lacked the romantic appeal of “gunboat diplomacy” on the Spanish Main. Yet for political scientists, usually more interested in data than drama, there was much logistical fascination in the increased power of the House. Thanks to the census of 1900 and the election of 1902, a record apportionment of 386 representatives now crowded the lower chamber. One hundred and twenty were freshmen, and more than half of those were Democrats. But the Republican total was still large enough for the new Speaker to wield a formidable majority. Moving fast while Senate leaders took up the Panama treaty, Joseph Cannon played host to a stream of callers, lavishing them with large confidences and small cigars. “I believe in consultin’ the boys,” he said in the hayseed accent he liked to affect, “findin’ out what most of ‘em want and then goin’ ahead and doin’ it.”
What “the boys” (i.e., Uncle Joe himself) wanted was to remind the Senate of his famous threat about “the right of the majority to rule.” On 19 November, the House voted overwhelmingly in favor of a reciprocity bill for Cuba, based on the Senate’s own treaty terms. Nothing remained but due process to make it law, whereupon the senatorial beet-sugar lobby maneuvered for adjournment, in order to mount a filibuster during the regular session.
Cannon pointed out that if two houses were needed to pass a bill, two houses were also needed to vote for adjournment. As far as he was concerned, the special session could run on through its statutory limit on 7 December. Senators from remote states were thus denied a Thanksgiving vacation, while the Speaker laughed at their discomfiture, ash peppering his vest.
MARK HANNA, who had been noticeably subdued since coming back to town, went to spend the holiday in New York, at the home of J. P. Morgan.
His uncharacteristic quietness was caused partly by exhaustion and partly by a new strain on his relations with the White House. The President had offended him by asking him to “manage” the Roosevelt campaign of 1904. If that was a ploy to head off any last chance of a Hanna candidacy, it was a remarkably obvious one, insulting to the Senator’s intelligence. All Hanna wanted to do was enjoy the afterglow of his triumphant re-election. If the