There was a certain embarrassment involved in preaching unselfishness in Mexico and Central America at a time when the United States was practising selfishness and dishonesty in Panama.

For, in the opinion of the Ambassador and that of most other dispassionate students of the Panama treaty, the American policy on Panama tolls amounted to nothing less.
To one unskilled in legal technicalities, the Panama controversy involved no great difficulty.

Since 1850 the United States and Great Britain had had a written understanding upon the construction of the Panama Canal.

The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, which was adopted that year, provided that the two countries should share equally in the construction and control of the proposed waterway across the Isthmus.

This idea of joint control had always rankled in the United States, and in 1901 the American Government persuaded Great Britain to abrogate the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty and agree to another--the Hay-Pauncefote--which transferred the rights of ownership and construction exclusively to this country.