It is obvious that the annexation by the United States of Hawaii and the Philippines, the beginnings of an American oversea empire, had greatly strengthened the case for a canal owned and controlled by the United States, and bringing the eastern coasts, the governmental centre of the States, into far more direct communication with these new acquisitions in the west. Mr. M'Kinley's pronouncement was soon followed by conversations between Mr. John Hay, the American Secretary of State, and Lord Pauncefote, British Ambassador at Washington. The result was a treaty which was laid before the Senate in February 1900. This first attempt, however, was unsuccessful. The American people were annoyed to find that it did not abrogate the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, but left the United States with something very short of that independent control which they desired. Amendments were introduced, and, so altered, the treaty was ratified by the Senate on December 20, 1900. But in this new shape it proved unacceptable to the British government, and it was permitted to lapse; Lord Lansdowne, however, suggesting that another attempt at agreement should be made. It may be asked why Great Britain, who had hitherto taken the view that it had nothing to gain, and perhaps much to lose, from the reconsideration of the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, should now have been so willing to bring it under review. There was a variety of reasons. The government of the United States had protested for nearly fifty years against the agreement, and this pertinacity, together with the changed conditions since the Spanish-American War, may have weighed with the British government. Then the Alaskan boundary question was at that time still under discussion between the two countries, and a settlement was proving difficult. An obstinate resistance to the United States over the canal question might have continued that deadlock indefinitely. At this time, too, England was at the beginning of the Boer War, and finding that business a good deal more intricate than she had expected. The sentiment of Anglo-American friendship had also grown much warmer since the days when Lord Granville had repulsed the advances of Mr. Blaine. In November 1901 a new treaty made its appearance. This was ratified by the Senate without amendment, and was ultimately concluded between the two Powers, being known as the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty.[3]