61.

It is a proof of the _bona fides_ of President Taft that he desired
that the American Courts might be enabled to decide this question. In a
message to Congress, dated August 19, 1912, in which the President
stated his conviction that the Panama Canal Act under consideration did
not violate the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, he _inter alia_ suggested that
Congress should pass the following resolution:--

"That nothing contained in the Act, entitled 'An Act to provide for
the opening, maintenance, protection, and operation of the Panama
Canal, and the sanitation and government of the Canal zone,' shall
be deemed to repeal any provision of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty or
to affect the judicial construction thereof, and in any wise to
impair any rights or privileges which have been or may be acquired
by any foreign nation under the treaties of the United States
relative to tolls or other charges for the passage of vessels
through the Panama Canal, and that when any alien ... considers
that the charging of tolls ... pursuant to the provisions of this
Act violates in any way such treaty rights or privileges such alien
shall have the right to bring an action against the United States
for redress of the injury which he considers himself to have
suffered; and the District Courts of the United States are hereby
given jurisdiction to hear and determine such cases, to decree
their appropriate relief, and from decision of such District Courts
there shall be an appeal by either party to the action of the
Supreme Court of the United States."

Congress, however, has not given effect to the suggestion of the
President, and the American Courts have not, therefore, the opportunity
of giving a judicial interpretation to the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty and of
deciding the question whether or no through the Panama Canal Act has
arisen a conflict between American Municipal Law and International Law
as emanating from the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty.

IX.

It has been asserted that the United States is bound by her general
arbitration treaty of April 4, 1908, with Great Britain to have the
dispute concerning the interpretation of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty
decided by an award of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague.
It is, however, not at all certain that this dispute falls under the
British-American Arbitration Treaty. Article I of this treaty
stipulates:--

"D