On November 8, 1903, the revolution occurred. The Colombian troops stationed on the Isthmus joined in the revolution, and there was no bloodshed, except the life of an unfortunate Chinaman.
Roosevelt immediately recognized the Republic of Panama and the other principal nations did likewise. A canal treaty was at once negotiated with the new republic, and, after considerable debate in the Senate, the treaty was ratified by that body and the work on the canal began.
Roosevelt’s case against Colombia was that, so long as the United States was considering the alternative route through Nicaragua, Colombia eagerly pressed this country to build a canal across the Isthmus. When the United States was committed to this latter course, Colombia, under her usurper, refused to fulfil the agreement, with the hope of securing the rights and property of the French Panama Company, so as to secure the $40,000,000 the United States had authorized as payment to this company. John Hay thus defended Roosevelt’s course: “The action of the President in the Panama matter is not only in the strictest accordance with the principles of justice and equity, and in line with the best precedents of our public policy, but it was the only course he could have taken in compliance with our treaty rights and obligations.”
In November, 1906, the President’s interest in the work on the canal led him to go in person to Panama. This act caused a storm of disapproval in certain quarters, similar to that which President Wilson met when he decided to attend the peace conference at Paris. Roosevelt’s critics pointed out that no President had ever gone beyond the bounds of his country. Roosevelt went and let his critics howl. Here, in one thing at least, Wilson and Roosevelt were in agreement, namely, that where the President of this country sets foot that place is within the sphere of the United States.
In Roosevelt’s opinion and in the opinion of the entire country, his act in sending the fleet upon its world mission did more to favorably advertise the United States to the world and to establish cordial international relations, than any other of his deeds as President. His object in sending the battle fleet on this voyage was to prove to foreign nations that American battleships could be assembled in the Pacific Ocean as well as in the Atlantic, without this movement assuming the nature of a threat against any Asiatic or European power.