Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. IV.djvu/204

164 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS critical from economic standpoint. Change pro posed would create much disappointment and lack of confidence among people." Later the offer was renewed, more in the tone of a command. Again it was declined, though this was the honor to which Mr. Taft had looked forward as the crowning prize of a lifetime of public service. By degrees the administrative horizon cleared, and when his work had reached a fairly safe stage the governor was called once more to Washington, this time to become secretary of war. No other office would have tempted him; but as the Philip pines were still under the jurisdiction of the war department, he felt that, as secretary, he could continue to direct their affairs to a large extent. The first task which fell to him now was to start the construction of the Isthmian canal, a gigantic enterprise on lines entirely novel, and assumed by the nation under peculiar circumstances. Colom bia had negotiated, but failed to ratify, a treaty granting the United States a lease of a right-of- way for an interoceanic canal ; the state of Panama, whose territory this traversed, at once seceded and set up an independent republic, which was recog nized at Washington, and from which a treaty was obtained substantially identical with that with drawn by Colombia. The whole transaction was so suddenly begun and so speedily ended as to call forth violent criticism, and this was used by some