When the Wilson administration came in, Secretary Bryan took up the negotiations with Colombia where Knox dropped them, and concluded a treaty according to the terms of which the United States was to express "sincere regret that anything should have occurred to interrupt or to mar the relations of cordial friendship that had so long subsisted between the two nations," and to pay Colombia $25,000,000. The treaty further granted Colombia the same preferential rights in the use of the canal which the Taft administration had proposed, and in return Colombia agreed to recognize the independence of Panama and to accept a boundary line laid down in the treaty. This treaty was submitted to the Senate June 16, 1914. As soon as its terms were made public ex-President Roosevelt denounced it as blackmail, and wrote a letter to the chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs requesting to be heard before any action was taken on the treaty. During the first session of the Sixty-sixth Congress in 1919 the Colombian treaty was reported from the Committee on Foreign Relations with important amendments. Article I, containing expressions of regret on the part of the United States for the events that had taken place on the isthmus, was entirely stricken out. The clause giving Colombia the right to transport through the canal its troops, materials of war, and ships of war, "even in case of war between Colombia and another country," was amended by the elimination of the words in quotations. The sum of $25,000,000, instead of being paid in cash, was to be paid in five annual installments. The Senate refused, however, to give its consent to the ratification of the treaty even in this form, and it is understood that it was proposed to cut the payment to Colombia down to $15,000,000. A great nation like the United States, which has always professed to be guided in international questions by high standards of justice and morality, cannot afford to delay indefinitely the settlement of a dispute of this kind with a weak nation like Colombia. President Roosevelt's action in the Panama matter made a bad impression throughout Latin America and caused our policy in the Caribbean to be regarded with grave suspicion. As to Colombia's rights in the matter, Secretary Bryan made the following statement in his argument before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in support of the treaty: