rovide, as a condition
for the privilege of using the Canal upon equal terms with other
nations, that other nations desiring to build up a particular trade
which involves the use of the Canal shall not either directly pay the
tolls for their vessels or refund to them the tolls levied upon them,
the United States could not be prevented from doing the same.

I have no doubt that this contention is correct, but paying the tolls
direct for vessels using the Canal or refunding to them the tolls
levied is not the same as exempting them from the payment of tolls.
Since, as I have shown above in V (1), p. 30, every vessel using the
Canal shall, according to Article III, No. 1, of the Hay-Pauncefote
Treaty, bear a proportionate part of the cost of construction,
maintenance, and administration of the Canal, the proportionate part of
such cost to be borne by foreign vessels would be higher in case the
vessels of the United States were exempt from the payment of tolls. For
this reason the exemption of American vessels would involve such a
discrimination against foreign vessels as is not admissible according
to Article III, No. 1.

VII.

With regard to the whole question of the interpretation of Article III
of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, the fact is of interest that prominent
members of the American Senate as well as a great part of the more
influential American Press, at the time the Panama Canal Act was under
the consideration of the Senate, emphatically asserted that any special
privileges to be granted to American vessels would violate this
Article. President Taft, his advisers, and the majority of the Senate
were of a different opinion, and for this reason the Panama Canal Act
has become American Municipal Law.

It is likewise of interest to state the fact that the majority of the
Senate as constituted thirteen years ago took a different view from the
majority of the present Senate, a fact which becomes apparent from an
incident in the Senate in December 1900, during the deliberations on
the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of February 5, 1900, the unratified precursor
of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of November 18, 1901. Senator Bard moved
an amendment, namely, that the United States reserves the right in the
regulation and management of the Canal to discriminate in respect of
the charges of the traffic in favour of vessels of her own citizens
engaged in the American coasting trade, but this amendment was rejected
by 43 to 27 vo