PANAMA: Visual Evidence

November is a touchy month for Panama’s national sensibilities, because it has three blood-stirring anniversaries: independence from Colombia on the 3rd, the Canal Zone-establishing treaty with the U.S. on the 18th, liberation from Spain on the 28th. Last November Panamanian nationalists twice made bloody attempts to invade the Canal Zone and plant the Panamanian flag there. The following month President Eisenhower agreed that the flag should indeed fly as “visual evidence that Panama does have titular sovereignty” over the U.S.-occupied Zone, but the House of Representatives voted a resolution against letting the Panamanian flag be flown in the Zone. Last week, with Congress adjourned and another November looming, Ike ruled that Panama’s flag of red, white and blue squares will henceforth fly daily with the U.S. flag in the Canal Zone plaza just over the border from Panama’s legislative building.