THE INTEROCEANIC CANAL PROBLEM 185 



between the great nations of the world, allowing them, under 

 proper conditions, to condemn territory for the use and interests 

 of the world in general. Such a canal could offer no question 

 as to its position in public law, for the element of private 

 ownership would be entirely eliminated. 



Reasoning on this subject is much confused, because a ship 

 canal, partaking of the nature of an arm of the sea and also 

 of any artificial transit route through the territory of a state, 

 admits of the conflicting arguments which a double analogy 

 must always furnish. OneJs, however, enabled to maintain 

 with fewer violations of ^recognized legal principles that a 

 canal built by a nation through its own territory and cui- 

 necting two open seas is not a public highway, uncondition- 

 ally open to the world's use. It would be going too far to 

 assert that when a nation at great expense connects two 

 oceans by a channel within its own domain, it possesses no 

 more right over its transit regulations than does the world in 

 general. 



Considering, then, the various attributes of ship canals7as 

 compared with those of natural waterways, one is led to 

 assume that if the Nicaragua Canal shall be constructed by 

 the United States, it will not become " an arm of the sea " ; 

 and that the United States will not necessarily be deprived 

 by international law of the superior rights of the builder and 

 private owner. 



If international law has not yet fully extended its system 

 over artificial channels connecting open seas, commercial 

 powers have already felt the need of such an advance. Ex- 

 perience has partially, if not fully, demonstrated the advisa- 

 Mlity of such control over ship canals, and the tendency 

 therefore is to invest them with international character. This 

 seems to call for some definite understanding on the subject 

 among the various nations interested. 



Although the qualities belonging to an artificial waterway 

 do not entitle the nations of the world, as a right, to a voice 

 in its control, yet for the sake of harmony, for the best inter- 

 ests of the builder, and in order better to serve those whose 

 patronage is desired in the use of the channel, it has been 



