Separation of Panama from Colombia
The separation of Panama from Colombia was an event that occurred on November 3, 1903, after the Thousand Days War, and which triggered the proclamation of the Republic of Panama .
After its independence from Spain in 1821, the Isthmus of Panama voluntarily joined Gran Colombia with the understanding that within it, it would maintain economic and political autonomy. With the disintegration of said State, from 1831 it became part of the nascent Republic of New Granada, consequently being part of all the changes in denomination and political-territorial organization that thereafter had the now-called Republic of Colombia until 1903. During these historical periods in Panama there were around seventeen secession attempts and four consummated separations during the 19th century.
For Panamanian historiography, the proclamation of the Republic of Panama was devised by its political class, who, based on a liberal ideology, had been building a nationalist and autonomist consciousness since the end of the 18th century, which had the conditions to finally materialize during the situation generated by the United States government's claim to resume the construction works of the Panama Canal. On the other hand, for Colombian historiography, the secession of Panama constitutes an attack against the political-territorial integrity of Colombia, which was devised by the United States in association with the Isthmus liberal and conservative oligarchy of the time.
Background
_(14772359973).jpg)
Declared independence from Spain, on November 28, 1821, the rulers of Panama made the decision to voluntarily join Gran Colombia, an extinct state made up in most of its territory by present-day Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela and Panama. With the understanding that autonomy of economic and administrative management would be preserved.
In 1826, the year in which the Amphictyonic Congress was held in the Isthmus capital, Panama rejected the Bolivarian constitution, but this was not an obstacle to the first attempt to separate from Greater Colombia that year. Because the Colombian congress ignored commercial franchise applications for the isthmus, frustrating Panamanian aspirations, a separatist movement arose to turn Panama into a Hanseatic country under the protection of the United Kingdom and the United States. The movement was, however, repressed by the Colombian military stationed on the isthmus.
Separated from Gran Colombia, two new countries emerged from the departments that made up the northern and southern regions called the State of Venezuela and the State of Ecuador.
The provinces that geographically occupied the central part of the disintegrated Gran Colombia, which at that time included the former departments of Boyacá, Cauca, Cundinamarca, Magdalena and Istmo (Panama) decided to form a new state.
Through the Agreement of Apulo (carried out on April 28, 1831), General Rafael Urdaneta, the last president of Gran Colombia, handed over command to Domingo Caicedo (May 3, 1831). The provisional name adopted by the Republic of Granada from that moment on was proclaimed as the State of New Granada.
On some occasions, soldiers in the Isthmian territory, known as the department of the Isthmus under centralism or the Sovereign State of Panama under federalism, had tried to separate, become independent from the Colombian government or de facto self-govern, the most important being in 1830, 1831 and 1832; meanwhile later there were popular revolts in Colombia (in fact six civil wars in 82 years). In 1840 and for a year the State of the Isthmus was established, making a clear record that it would rejoin New Granada if it adopted the federal regime; and during part of the Thousand Days War (1899- 1902), a civil conflict that devastated Colombia, a nation to which Panama then belonged, although in a state of rebellion, since many of its leaders fought against the conservative government and in favor of the Colombian Liberal Party. Between 1846 and 1848, the The governments of New Granada and the United States had signed the Mallarino-Bidlack treaty, with which the United States guaranteed the sovereignty of New Granada over the isthmus. Later, in 1850 and 1868, the isthmus was also separated from Colombia, but an effective Colombian action with armed support from the United States, restored the territory to the country, invoking the Mallarino-Bidlack Treaty.[citation required] On November 21, 1902 in the Bay of Panama, liberals and conservatives ratified the end of the conflict aboard the battleship Wisconsin of the US Navy, where it was drafted and finally was signed the treaty of the same name that ended the war. The War of the Thousand Days devastated the department of Panama, where, between October 1899 and May 1902, there were more than sixty battles. General Victoriano Lorenzo, an indigenous Panamanian and head of the local liberal troops during the War of the Thousand Days, after the signing of the Wisconsin Peace Treaty, which had taken place on November 21, 1902, celebrated on November 28, 1903, the independence of Panama that occurred in 1821 with his troops in the town of San Carlos, arriving some ex-combatants fired into the air and others cheered Panama as an independent nation, from where rumors spread that Victoriano Lorenzo's troops rejected the treaty. In this circumstance, General Benjamín Herrera met with Lorenzo to clarify the facts, agreeing that in order to carry out a more exhaustive investigation, Lorenzo would remain on board a ship anchored in the Bay of Panama. For the month of December, nothing was resolved about his situation and he tried to escape from him, being arrested and imprisoned this time in the headquarters of the Colombian troops. Subsequently, in the month of May, a criminal trial was held against him that found him guilty in less than 24 hours and sentenced him to be shot the next day, May 15, despite the fact that the Peace Treaty signed between the parties in conflict aboard the Wisconsin, it prohibited the application of penalties to those who had participated in the armed conflict. On July 25 of the same year, the printing press that published the newspaper "El Lápiz" was assaulted by order of the military commander of Panama, General José Vásquez Cobo, brother of the Colombian Minister of War, as a consequence of the detailed narration of the firing squad and their protests. This event contributed to increasing the distrust of the Panamanian liberals towards the Colombian conservative regime and to their joining the separatist cause.
In May 1901, the United States and England had signed the Hay-Pauncefote treaty with which Colombian sovereignty over the isthmus was disavowed, and it was given the status of “zone of international importance”. President José Manuel Marroquín attempted negotiations to save Colombian sovereignty over the isthmus, and sent Carlos Martínez Silva to Washington, who resigned shortly after due to the seriousness of the situation. Marroquín then put José Vicente Concha in charge of the negotiations, who faced a hostile US congress. In that year, the United States Senate approved the Spooner Act, which defined that the optimal route for a new canal was that of Panama (and not that of Nicaragua or Mexico), President Roosevelt was authorized to indemnify 40 million dollars to the French company that owns the rights, and to obtain in perpetuity a strip of land 5 km wide on each side of the canal. Concha rejected the proposal, making it clear that Colombia's sovereignty over the isthmus was not in dispute, and requested an increase in the amount offered to Colombia to cede the canal concession to the United States once the French company had sold its rights. Concha ended up resigning because of Marroquín's intention to accept the conditions of the United States, so the president replaced him with Tomás Herrán, who took advantage of Germany's ratification of building the canal to sign the Herrán-Hay treaty (22 December). January 1903), with which the United States granted Colombia what Concha had requested from the US Congress.
The Herrán–Hay treaty was attacked in the Senate by former President Miguel Antonio Caro, Marroquín's main opponent. Caro convinced congress that the Herrán-Hay Treaty was detrimental to Colombia's interests and sovereignty, and achieved a majority vote against the treaty on August 18, causing a worldwide scandal. US bankers, led by magnate J. Pierpont Morgan, decided to support the independence of Panama and on October 27 there was an armed invasion by Penonomé (quote). The directors of the Panama railroad company bought several Panamanian leaders and General Esteban Huertas (?), head of the Colombian Guard. In July 1903, a brother of Alfredo Vásquez Cobo, the Colombian Minister of War, the Panamanian military chief, José Vásquez Cobo, staged a coup on the Isthmus and deposed the governor, Facundo Mutis Durán. Marroquín, instead of sanctioning the coup leader, appointed José Domingo de Obaldía governor. The government of Marroquín (who never knew the sea), ignored the rumors of separation to such an extent that on November 3, 1903, Pablo Arosemena sent Marroquín a telegram from Panama City giving a part of normality in the isthmus. On the morning of the same day, a movement of Panamanian leaders supported by a large part of the population proclaimed independence and established the Republic of Panama, which was recognized by the United States the following day and with which relations were established on December 6. November, the day the news of the separation reached Bogotá.
Home
José Domingo de Obaldía would be appointed governor of Panama, a position he had previously held.
José Agustín Arango, an Isthmian politician, began to work secretly preparing the separatist movement. A clandestine revolutionary junta was formed around him to plan a revolution aimed at consolidating the separation of the Isthmus from Colombian sovereignty, to negotiate directly with the United States for the construction of the canal. Apart from Arango himself, the conspiracy network was made up of Manuel Amador Guerrero, a doctor; Nicanor de Obarrio, soldier and general of the Paraguayan army, and by others such as Ricardo Arias, Federico Boyd, Carlos Constantino Arosemena, Tomás Arias, Isabelina Rojas, and Manuel Espinosa Batista. But the operational part, the one with the greatest risk, fell to Amador Guerrero, who traveled to the United States in search of support for the plan, since the North American forces had helped the Colombian army in the past.[ citation required] He also obtained the support of important liberal leaders in Panama and the support of the military commander Esteban Huertas.
With all this support, the implementation of the separatist plan was arranged for an undefined day in November 1903. However, a rumor generated in Colombia was about to ruin the plan. Reports received reported a supposed Nicaraguan invasion of the Isthmus through the region of Calovébora, on the north coast of Panama. This report, and the insistent rumors about something that was brewing in Panama, caused Colombia to mobilize the Shooters Battalion from Barranquilla. The commander of that battalion secretly brought instructions to replace José Domingo De Obaldía and General Esteban Huertas, who were no longer trusted in Bogotá.
The Shooters Battalion, under the command of General Juan B. Tovar and Ramón G. Amaya, arrived in the city of Colón on the morning of November 3, 1903. They had no problems disembarking, but their transportation to the city of Panama suffered many setbacks due to the complicity of the Trans-Isthmic Railroad authorities with the conspirators, among them the American superintendent J.R. Shaler. After many excuses, the General Staff was able to move towards the capital. In Colón the troops remained under the command of Colonel Eliseo Torres.
Once they arrived in Panama City, Juan B. Tovar and his other officers were arrested on the instructions of General Esteban Huertas, who commanded the Colombia Battalion, whose leadership he intended to replace the recently arrived general.
Upon learning of the imminent revolutionary action, Commander John Hubbard of the US ship "Nashville", then in the waters of the port and who had previously delayed the landing of Colombian troops in Colón, proceeded to prevent their transport and any landing later, arguing that the "neutrality" of the railway, an argument that the US authorities had used on previous occasions to the contrary.[citation needed]
After the Colombian military contingent had been captured and the mobilization of the troops in Colón had been frozen, actions were hastened to declare the separation of the Isthmus. The Revolutionary Junta then proceeded to declare that same afternoon, the separation of the Isthmus. Some Panamanians stormed the armories and took the weapons, but it was not necessary to use them. Governor José Domingo de Obaldía was taken into custody for representing the Colombian authority.
A naval squadron anchored in Panama Bay was forced to surrender without putting up a fight. The Municipal Council met under the Presidency of Demetrio H. Brid (maximum authority in Panamanian territory before the emergence of a de facto government), and proclaimed in an act the will of the people to be free and to establish their own, independent Government, and sovereign under the name of the Republic of Panama. Demetrio H. Brid then became the First de facto President of the recently formed Republic of Panama, naming on November 4, 1903 the Provisional Government Junta that would be in charge of the administration of the State until that the National Constituent Convention in February 1904 designated Manuel Amador Guerrero as the first Constitutional President of the Republic of Panama.
Consequences
On November 13, 1903, the United States formally recognized the Republic of Panama (after having unofficially recognized it from November 6 to 7), France would do so the following day and before the end of November, fifteen other countries in the Americas, Europe and Asia would too.
On November 18 of that same year, the US Secretary of State, John Milton Hay, signed a treaty for the construction of the Panama Canal together with Philippe Bunau-Varilla, although it was highly controversial due to the speed with which was approved and because Bunau-Varilla had proposed himself as a representative of the Panamanian government. The treaty was later ratified by the Provisional Junta of the Government of Panama and by the United States Senate.
In Colombia, the news of the separation from Panama was not known until December 6 in Bogotá. The reason given to explain the delay was that the submarine cable that made communications between the two regions possible had been damaged in those days.
It was the Colombian ambassador in Ecuador, who sent the news to the Colombian government, which hid the news for a few days, to prevent possible riots that would occur in Bogotá.
There were then two kinds of response: send a diplomatic mission to Panama to find out if the Panamanians would be willing to back down. He also offered to reconsider the Herrán-Hay treaty, rejected by the Colombian Senate, and even promised to make Panama City the capital of Colombia. The mission met aboard the USS Mayflower. The Panamanian delegation that was formed by Constantino Arosemena, Tomás Arias and Eusebio A. Morales, rejected all the proposals.
Colombia then sends another delegation of the highest level, in which General Rafael Reyes, Pedro Nel Ospina, Jorge Holguín and Lucas Caballero stood out. Panama was once again represented by Constantino Arosemena and Tomás Arias, now accompanied by Carlos A. Mendoza, Nicanor de Obarrio and Antonio Zubieta. The meetings were held on the ship Canada, from that country. There was no agreement between the representatives and Rafael Reyes returned to the United States.