I have no doubt that this contention is correct, but paying the tolls direct for vessels using the Canal or refunding to them the tolls levied is not the same as exempting them from the payment of tolls. Since, as I have shown above in V (1), p. 30, every vessel using the Canal shall, according to Article III, No. 1, of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, bear a proportionate part of the cost of construction, maintenance, and administration of the Canal, the proportionate part of such cost to be borne by foreign vessels would be higher in case the vessels of the United States were exempt from the payment of tolls. For this reason the exemption of American vessels would involve such a discrimination against foreign vessels as is not admissible according to Article III, No. 1. VII. With regard to the whole question of the interpretation of Article III of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, the fact is of interest that prominent members of the American Senate as well as a great part of the more influential American Press, at the time the Panama Canal Act was under the consideration of the Senate, emphatically asserted that any special privileges to be granted to American vessels would violate this Article. President Taft, his advisers, and the majority of the Senate were of a different opinion, and for this reason the Panama Canal Act has become American Municipal Law. It is likewise of interest to state the fact that the majority of the Senate as constituted thirteen years ago took a different view from the majority of the present Senate, a fact which becomes apparent from an incident in the Senate in December 1900, during the deliberations on the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of February 5, 1900, the unratified precursor of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of November 18, 1901. Senator Bard moved an amendment, namely, that the United States reserves the right in the regulation and management of the Canal to discriminate in respect of the charges of the traffic in favour of vessels of her own citizens engaged in the American coasting trade, but this amendment was rejected by 43 to 27 votes. As Article II, No. 1, of the unratified Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1900 comprises a stipulation almost identical with that of Article III, No. 1, of the present Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, there can be no doubt that the Bard amendment endeavoured to secure such a privilege to American coasting trade vessels as the United States now by the Panama Canal Act grants to these vessels. But the Bard amendment was defeated because the majority of the Senate was, in 1900, convinced that it involved a violation of the principle of equality for vessels of all nations pronounced by Article II, No. 1, of the unratified Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1900. VIII. The conflict concerning the interpretation of the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty throws a flood of light on the practice of the United States respecting the relations between International Law and her Municipal Law.