Philippe Bunau-Varilla
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Philippe Jean Bunau-Varilla (fēlēp' zhäN bünō'-värēyä') (1859-1940), commonly referred to as simply Philippe Bunau-Varilla, was a French engineer and soldier. Notably with the assistance of American lobbyist and lawyer William Nelson Cromwell, Bunau-Varrilla greatly influenced the United States's decision upon the site of construction for the famed Panama Canal that today provides a vital waterway for trade shipment between the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. He was also largely responsible for prompting then United States President Theodore Roosevelt to passively foment Panama's revolution for independence from Colombia. Because all of this was accomplished within a span of just two years, he could realistically be the most successful lobbyist ever to set foot in the American political arena.
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[edit] Nascent career
Bunau-Varilla was born on July 26, 1859 in Paris, France. Graduating at age 20 from the acclaimed École Polytechnique, he remained in France for three more years, thereupon leaving the École des Ponts et Chausées and his occupation there in French public works. He arrived in Panama in 1884, newly employed with the Panama Canal Company of Ferdinand de Lessep. Within a year he had temporarily gained the highest position of general management within the organization.
[edit] Early Setbacks
After Lessep went bankrupt in 1888 amid charges of fraud, Bunau-Varilla was left stranded on the isthmus of Panama, and began in earnest a ravenous search for a new opportunity to recommence the failing effort at canal construction. When the New Panama Canal Company sprang up back in his homeland France, Bunau-Varilla hopped aboard with a large stock purchase. However, as Lessep's company before it, the New Panama Canal Company soon abandoned the hopeless attempt at building the canal. In order that the endeavor would not become a complete financial failure, the New Panama Canal Company attempted to sell the land to the United States. Then headed by Grover Cleveland, a politician with anti-imperialist leanings, the U.S. government would remain indifferent on the matter until the ascension of a more opportunistic leader in Theodore Roosevelt.
[edit] Power of Persuasion
Bunau-Varilla, as vociferous as ever, was incessant in his push for the construction of the canal. With aid from the New Panama Canal Company's representative attorney in New York, William Nelson Cromwell, he eventually persuaded the government to select the Panamanian route. Despite often contradictory claims by mainstream history books, Bunau-Varilla, more than any other person, was responsible for the advent of the Panama Canal project. Through his extensive lobbying of both business pioneers, government officials, and the American public, Bunau-Varilla successfully persuaded the U.S. Senate to appropriate $40 million to the New Panama Canal Company, in the form of the Spooner Act of 1902. When opponents voiced their interest in constructing a canal through Nicaragua, which was a less politically volatile nation, Bunau-Varilla actively campaigned throughout the Northeast, carrying pictures and postage stamps of Nicaragua's Mt. Momotombo spewing ash and lava over the proposed alternative route.
[edit] Route to Success
Although his company was now in possession of a vast sum of money with which to build the canal, there still remained the concern of whether or not the Colombian government would cooperate. When a treaty between the South American power and the United states fell apart in the Senate, Bunau-Varilla began drawing up war plans with acquainted Panamanian juntas in New York. By the eve of the so called war for Panamanian independence, the wily French engineer had already drafted the isthmian nation's constitution, flag, military establishment, and promised to float the entire government on his own checkbook. Although prepared for a small-scale civil war, Bunau-Varilla was relieved the affair amounted to little more than the incidental killing of a Chinese civilian and the death of a donkey. As promised, President Roosevelt, on the conjectured day of battle, had superimposed the Atlantic Fleet of the U.S. Navy between Colombian forces and the scrappy force of Panamanian guerrillas.
Bunau-Varilla later negotiated, as Panama's Ambassador to the United States, with the American Secretary of State John Hay, establishing the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty, which gave control of the Panama Canal to the U.S.
[edit] Post-Canal Accomplishments
In all but the most pedantic of textbooks, Bunau-Varilla's life begins and ends with the Panama Canal. Certainly, this was his most significant contribution to history, but his life would go on for another 37 years after his Panama venture.
During WWI, the now quite esteemed and recognized statesmen served as an officer in the French army and subsequently parted with a leg at the Battle of Verdun. As an elder lobbyist, he still pursued his life's primary fancy and promoted altering the canal from a lock system to a sea-level waterway. He passed away in Paris, France on May 18, 1940.
[edit] Miscellaneous Factoids
- One of the more interesting and certainly most puzzling aspects of Bunau-Varilla's life was his source of income. Guests to his elegant Paris residence often reflected on the immaculate grandeur of the home. Bunau-Varilla was known to entertain friends and strategic partners at some of the most pricey locations of his time. Historians, however, have never been able to figure out where Bunau-Varilla got the money to lead such a grandiose existence. He neither made much money as an engineer during the first Panama Canal project (under de Lesseps)nor inherited significant amounts of relatives or parents. Bunau-Varilla's source of income is a perplexing historical mystery that is still unsolved.
[edit] Sources
- [1]
- Encyclopedia Britannica
- Kennedy, David M., Lizabeth Cohen, and Thomas A. Bailey. American Pageant. 12th ed. U.S.: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.
- McCullough, David. The Path Between the Seas (best published resource on Bunau-Varilla)
- Fishman, Edward B. (Bunau-Varilla historian)
