THE MONROE DOCTRINE A POLITICAL HISTORY OF ISTHMUS TRANSIT, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE NICARAGUA CANAL PROJECT AND THE ATTITUDE OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT THERETO 54442 BY LINDLEY MILLER KEASBEY, PH.D., R.P.D. 27 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET 24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND The Knickerbocker Press 1806 U.VA. JUN 15 1995 LAW LIBRARY COPYRIGHT, 1896 BY G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS Entered at Stationers' Hall, London OCEANS 14.2 .N4 The Knickerbocker Press, New Rochelle, A.Y. -85-8/10143 S' PREFACE. INCE the discovery of America, much has been said and a great deal has been written concerning the question of isthmus transit; but during all these four centuries, comparatively little has apparently been accomplished toward actually joining the seas. The problem of interoceanic communication has, however, in our day at last entered upon its practical stage, and without being over-sanguine, we may now look forward to its not far distant solution. While the final technical plans for the shipcanal are being perfected, it has, therefore, seemed to me opportune to undertake the history of this project which has been so long before the eyes of the civilized world as an immediate possibility, and which ere long, let us hope, will be a realized fact. Owing to the geographical position of the United States and their resultant political ambition, the subject is one of peculiar importance to us Americans, and it is under this settled conviction that the present work has been conceived and carried out. If the narrative exhibits a national prejudice, therefore, it may rightly be attributed to the fact that the book is written avowedly from the Monroe doctrine standpoint. |