14 Comments

Give them back their $1. OK, $1 in 1977 is worth $5.41 now. Give them $5.41 and take back the canal.

Get a receipt.

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Merry Christmas to you!!!

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A very Merry Christmas and a blessed new year to you and your family as well.

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Did Jimmy Carter have the authority to give away the Panama Canal? Where is that written in the Constitution? Did Congress get involved in giving away American assets for $1.00z. Is that all it cost to build? How can you give away what belongs to the country? I never understood this. And no one here complained about it? Can someone explain this to me.

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In 1977 many, many Americans complained about this decision. Here is what I found on Wikipedia (take it with a grain of salt): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torrijos%E2%80%93Carter_Treaties#:~:text=The%20treaties%20guaranteed%20that%20Panama,National%20Guard%2C%20General%20Omar%20Torrijos.

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Wasn’t it obeyme that ok’d the Chinese take it over?

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Carter viewed America as an imperialist nation. I think Panama should have paid us the ENTIRE cost of building it in current dollars.

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Most of the 38,000 workers who died were French and West Indian laborers during the French attempt to build the canal. 350 white Americans died in the American phase of building of the Panama Canal. 4,500 West Indian black workers also died, who were the ones who did the actual physical digging work and lived in tents in swampland areas. Most died from mosquito-born malaria. Most of the laborers were not Americans. They were the overseers, engineers, and military personnel on the job. The American military provided living quarters for white American workers that were fumigated and had screened portable cubicles to protect the occupants from getting bit at night. The person who figured this out was Colonel William Crawford Gorgas in March 1904, head of hospitals and sanitation for the American Army, and he was instrumental in eliminating malaria from the urban areas around the canal.

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Let's not forget that some 38,000 Americans lost their lives to malaria and other tropical diseases while building the Panama Canal.

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How do you break a treaty?

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With agreement of Congress, I think.

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