Taft Doesn't Bar Canal Arbitration.

New York Times 100 years ago today, October 4, 1912:
But Hopes, He Tells London Correspondent, That Diplomacy Will Avail.
SUPREME COURT A RECOURSE
This, It Is Stated, Would Not Prevent an Appeal Thereafter to The Hague.
Special Cable to The New York Times.
    LONDON, Friday, Oct. 4.— The Times through its correspondent at Beverly, has received a further statement from President Taft regarding his Panama policy.
    After saying that the President asked him to make it clear that his allusions to unfair criticisms contained in his first statement to The London Times was not directed against The Times, the correspondent proceeds:
    "It may be authoritatively stated that in none of his utterances, official or other, has the President wished to be understood to imply that he refused to countenance an appeal to The Hague. He has, of course, expressed the earnest hope that the question may be susceptible of diplomatic settlement and is awaiting with great interest the detailed British argument against the law. Further, it may be stated that the attitude of the Administration cannot be defined, especially as Secretary Knox has not yet returned from Japan.
    "It is, however, possible that when Congress meets the President will repeat his recommendation for the passage of a resolution, making the controversy susceptible of appeal to the Supreme Court, a step, which is less meaningless than it seems at first sight, inasmuch as without some such resolution the Supreme Court would, in the event of an appeal by a British subject against treatment he received in connection with the canal, follow the normal practice of deciding the case with reference to the latest law dealing with the subject, namely the Panama act, rather than with reference to the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty.
    "If the President takes this course, it will be largely because he believes that an adverse decision of the Supreme Court would be less galling to Americans than an arbitral award. Nor, if judgment were to go against British interests, would Great Britain have lost her legal right to demand arbitration."
    The foregoing was evidently authorised by President Taft. The Times in an editorial puts a declaration into the mouth of the President himself.