The real cause of the failure of the Hay-Herran treaty is not difficult to discover. The concession of the New Panama Canal Company under one of its renewals expired October 31, 1893. It was then extended for a year, and, in 1894, was extended again for a period of 10 years. Still another extension was granted, which carried the date of expiration to October 31, 1910. This last extension was granted by the President without the consent of the Colombian Congress. In 1903, when the Hay-Herran treaty was pending, the validity of this last extension was denied, and the assertion made that on October 31, 1901, all of the rights and property of the New Panama Canal Company would revert to the Colombian Government. The United States had agreed to pay to the New Panama Canal Company $40,000,000 for its concession and property. According to Representative Henry T. Rainey, of Illinois, who for years led the attack in the United States Congress on the acts of President Roosevelt in connection with the Panaman revolution, the purpose of Colombia in defeating the treaty was to wait until the expiration of the concession, when all of the property of the canal company would revert to Colombia, and it could then sell it to the United States and get the $40,000,000, or any other amount it could persuade the United States to pay. Of course, the New Panama Canal Company did not look upon such an arrangement with any degree of complacency. It felt that it was a deliberate scheme upon the part of the Colombian Government to mulct it out of its property and its rights. As a result it was naturally ready to lend aid and encouragement to any movement which would circumvent this purpose of Colombia. It found conditions in Panama just what it might have wished. The people of Panama felt that they had the same sort of grievance against Colombia that the people of the American colonies felt they had against England in 1776. The governors of the province were, with few exceptions, sent there from Bogota, and were entirely out of sympathy with the people of Panama. The taxes collected at Panama were carried to Bogota, as a rule, and the voice that the people of the Isthmus had in the Government of Colombia was negligible. Furthermore, they felt that they were entitled to their sovereignty.