# Spooner Act

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{{short description|1902 act of  the United States Congress}}
{{Use American English|date=June 2025}}
thumb|right| John Coit Spooner, United States Senator
from Wisconsin
The '''First Spooner Act''' of 1902 (also referred to as the '''Panama Canal Act''', 32 Stat. 481)<ref name=USNA-PCrec>{{cite web|title=Records of the Panama Canal|url=https://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/185.html|publisher=US National Archives|accessdate=12 January 2014}}</ref> was written by a [United States senator](/source/United_States_senator) from [Wisconsin](/source/Wisconsin), [John Coit Spooner](/source/John_Coit_Spooner), enacted on June 28, 1902, and signed by [President Roosevelt](/source/Theodore_Roosevelt) the following day. It authorized purchasing the assets of a [French](/source/France) syndicate called the ''Compagnie Nouvelle du Canal de Panama'', provided that a [treaty](/source/treaty) could be negotiated with the Republic of [Colombia](/source/Colombia).

The syndicate, headed by [Philippe-Jean Bunau-Varilla](/source/Philippe-Jean_Bunau-Varilla), sold at a price reduced from $110 million to only $40 million. US lawyer [William Nelson Cromwell](/source/William_Nelson_Cromwell) subsequently received a commission of $800,000 for his lobbying.<ref name=HC-PCA>{{cite web|title=Panama Canal Act [1902]|url=http://www.historycentral.com/documents/PanamaCanalact.html|publisher=History Central|accessdate=12 January 2014}}</ref><ref name=PCA>{{cite web|title=AMERICAN CANAL CONSTRUCTION|url=http://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/american.html|publisher=Panama Canal Authority|accessdate=12 January 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Kinzer|first=Stephen|title=Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq|url=https://archive.org/details/overthrow00step|url-access=registration|year=2007|pages=[https://archive.org/details/overthrow00step/page/56 56-62]|chapter=3. From a Whorehouse to a White House}}</ref>

The Spooner Act was followed by the [Hay–Bunau-Varilla Treaty](/source/Hay%E2%80%93Bunau-Varilla_Treaty) of November 18, 1903.

==See also==
* [History of the Panama Canal](/source/History_of_the_Panama_Canal)
* [Panama Canal Railway](/source/Panama_Canal_Railway)
* [Ferdinand de Lesseps](/source/Ferdinand_de_Lesseps)

==References==
<references/>

==External links==
* http://www.czbrats.com/Builders/spooner.htm
* http://www.answers.com/topic/panama-canal-purchase-act-1902

Category:Panama Canal
Category:United States federal admiralty and maritime legislation
Category:United States foreign relations legislation

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Spooner Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spooner_Act) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spooner_Act?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.