Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. IV.djvu/173

 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 137 the occasion when Congress ignored the message of Mr. Roosevelt urging some such step, and also exactly on the last day of his second term. Three months previous to this act, approved March 3, the National Rivers and Harbors Congress, composed of nearly 3,000 delegates from 44 States and Ter ritories, held sessions in Washington during three days, when addresses of a similar character to those of the Conservation Commission, some of them given by the same men, were made; and the Act was of course the direct consequence of this con ference. Two days before, on March 1, the House passed the Forest Reserve Bill. Panama Canal. An act of June 29, 1906, pro vided for lock construction and thus ended the controversy between those who upheld this plan and those who advocated a sea-level canal. On November 17, 1907, the President announced that the Government would issue fifty million Panama bonds and interest-bearing certificates to the amount of a hundred million. In January, 1908, he issued an executive order defining the powers of the Isthmian Canal Commission and its chair men. This was merely a comprehensive revision of the provisions of November 17, 1906, and sub sequent orders. In March, 1908, some troubles of the Republic of Panama were pacified by Mr. Taft, but in July, as the election then approached, marines were sent to the Isthmus. What changes