Excerpt from Address by Elihu Root: Before the Union League Club of Chicago, February 22, 1904 Sweden and Norway, Belgium, Nicaragua, Peru, Cuba, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Japan, Guatemala, Neth erlands, Venezuela, Portugal, in the order named. The independence of Panama, the grant to the United States of the right to construct the canal across the Isthmus, and the assumption by the United States of the duty to construct the canal and to maintain it for the equal benefit of mankind, are ac complished facts. Nothing can do away with them, unless it be some future war of conquest waged against the liberties of Pan ama, and at the same time against the rights of the United States held in trust for the commerce of the world. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.