After the rejection of the offer of the New Panama Canal Company by the House, President Roosevelt again called the members of the Isthmian Canal Commission together, and asked them to make a supplementary report in view of the offer in question. On a motion of Commissioner Morison the commission decided that, in consideration of the change of conditions brought about by the offer of the company to sell its property for $40,000,000, the Panama route was preferable. It has been stated that Professor Haupt, Senator Pasco, and two other members of the commission were reluctant to abandon the Nicaragua project; that President Roosevelt had made it quite clear to Admiral Walker that he expected the commission to accept the Panama Canal Company's offer; that Commissioners Noble and Pasco had given in, but that Professor Haupt stood out; and that he was induced to sign the report only after Admiral Walker had called him out of the committee room and pleaded with him to do so, stating that the President demanded a unanimous report. Professor Haupt afterwards publicly admitted the truth of this story in a signed article in a magazine. About this time the Senate Committee on Interoceanic Canals appointed a subcommittee of six members to study and report on the legal questions involved in the transfer of the New Panama Canal Company's title, and a majority reported that the company's title was defective and that it had no power to transfer. It was finally decided that the Senate Committee on Interoceanic Canals should make no report until all of the members of the Isthmian Canal Commission had appeared before it and testified. This delay permitted negotiations between the United States, the New Panama Canal Company, and the Republic of Colombia looking to a settlement of the question of title. The New Panama Canal Company was now thoroughly in earnest in its desire to dispose of its holdings to the United States, but the Republic of Colombia, desiring to drive a good bargain, held aloof. The hope of the situation as far as the Panama route was concerned, lay in Senator Marcus A. Hanna, of Ohio, who had come to espouse the Panama route. He declared he would not recommend the acceptance of the proposals of the New Panama Canal Company unless a satisfactory treaty could be obtained, and unless the shareholders of the company would ratify the action of the board of directors in making the offer. A meeting of the shareholders was called in February, 1902, at which the Republic of Colombia, holding a million dollars' worth of stock in the company, was represented by a Government delegate. He served formal notice on the company that it was forbidden, on pain of forfeiture of its concession, to sell its rights to the United States before that action was approved by the Colombian Government, there being a clause in the concession providing that in the event of such a sale to any foreign Government all rights, titles, and property should revert to Colombia.