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73. The correct answer is (A). In 1878, a French company under the direction of Ferdinand de Lesseps,
the builder of the Suez Canal, obtained from Colombia a concession to build a canal across its northern
province of Panama. After spending about $300 million, the French company ran out of money and had
to stop work on the project. In 1903, the United States negotiated a treaty with Colombia for the canal
rights, but the treaty was rejected by Colombia, which wanted more money. Phillipe Bunau-Varilla, the
former chief engineer of the canal project and a stockholder in the reorganized French company, engi-
neered a revolution to secure Panama’s independence from Colombia. The revolution succeeded mainly
because the United States Navy prevented Colombia from intervening to suppress the uprising. The
United States immediately recognized the new nation, and the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty secured to the
United States the canal rights on essentially the same terms that had been offered to Colombia.
74. The correct answer is (E). The United States and Great Britain both claimed the Oregon Country,
an area extending from the Pacific Ocean to the Rocky Mountains and from latitude of 42
°
north to
54
°
40
′ north. In the presidential campaign of 1844, James K. Polk’s supporters demanded that the
United States be given complete control over the territory or go to war with Britain. In the final
analysis, Polk compromised on the Oregon issue by agreeing in 1846 to extend the Line of 1818 that
marked the boundary between the United States and Canada all the way to the Pacific. Thus, the
territory was split between the United States and Great Britain along the 49th parallel.
75. The correct answer is (C). On the issue of civil rights, Kennedy initially continued the policies of
Eisenhower, who believed that the real problems of segregation could not be legislated out of exist-
ence. President Kennedy and his brother Robert, the Attorney General, concentrated on enforcing
voting rights legislation, hoping that once blacks had attained sufficient power at the polls segrega-
tion would be dismantled from within. Embarrassed by events in the Deep South in 1963, in which
television recorded the violence of white officials against blacks, Kennedy finally proposed a new
civil rights act prohibiting racial segregation in all public accommodations.