212 ORAL ARGUMENT OF HON. EDWARD J. PHELPS. 



torial limits, and territorial limits are usually sutlicieut for the purjiose. 

 There is usually no necessity to go out on the high sea to intercept a 

 vessel to enforce quarantine regulations. But suppose it became neces- 

 sary: suppose a vessel coming from some plague-stricken port, laden 

 with contagion which would ravage a whole continent, cannot be met 

 effectually within the three-mile limit, and it is necessary to intercei)t 

 her outside, is there any right to do it? Great Britain has asserted 

 that right by statutes that are on her Statute Book yet, and which are 

 mentioned with api)robation by writers and Judges. Suppose the case 

 of the cable to which my learned friend's attention was invited. Sup- 

 pose two nations established a cable and there is a party who, by 

 oyster-dredging or some industry at the bottoui of the sea, that is well 

 enough in itself, if it did not interrupt the operations of the cable, is 

 interrupting its operations and is threatening its destruction, and the 

 man says, " I am on the high seas; I am fishing. Fishing is a right on 

 the high seas. If it interrupts your cable, I cannot help that. You 

 must take care of yourself." Is there any remedy? My learned friend 

 says, "Yes, you have a treat3^ We have a treaty to prevent that 

 vei'y thing, showing that my illustration is not very far fetched. We 

 anticipate that by a treaty". With whom? All the nations of the 

 earth? No, that is practically impossible; if one nation is left out of 

 the treaty, that one may go and engage in the verj'^ operations that 

 endanger this cable. There is no obligation on the part of any nation 

 to euter into any treaty unless she pleases. Suppose any country is 

 invited by the United States to join in a convention for the protection 

 of a cable between Newfoundland and Ireland, which is a Government 

 work; the nation says, just as some of the countries replied to Mr. 

 Bayard's invitation to join in a convention for the preservation of the 

 seals, " There is no objection to it, but it does not interest us. We do 

 not care to go into it". The only nations that responded to Mr. Bayard 

 favorably were Kussia, Japan, and Great Britain. All the rest said it 

 did not matter, and put it aside; was a thing they had no interest in. 

 Now suppose that nation refuses to enter into a convention, or suppose 

 what is inevitable, that it is found impossible to extend it to every 

 sea-going nation on the face of the earth, or suppose in this case, as I 

 have supposed iu the case of the dynamite, the parties engaged in the 

 fishing are not under the special control of any nation, or are a parcel 

 of renegades from various nations. The question is, has the Govern- 

 ment a right to protect that valuable and important industry, or at 

 the instance of this gang of adventurers, must it submit to have it 

 destroyed. My learned friends have no answer to that, except to say, 

 there is a treaty. Lt does not meet the point. Tlie treaty does not 

 show that there would be no rights if there were no treaty. 



Suppose we have a light house out in the sea, more than three miles, 

 and somebody engages in an industry, or pursuit that endangers the 

 lighthouse, or perhaps entirely or largely obscures the light, so that 

 the vessels of the country that established it are deprived of the benefit 

 of the light, — what is my learned friend's answer to that? He says 

 the lighthouse is a part of the territory of the country. But on what 

 principle is a lighthouse part of the territory of the country 10 miles 

 out at sea? Upon what principle has a nation a right, if they are cor- 

 rect iu these theories, to put a light house out there and say, " It is 

 part of our territory?" Why none whatever. And even granting it 

 is a part of the territory, suppose you say, " This structure we have 

 erected at our own instance in a part of the sea which is the highwa;v 

 of nations and common to all the world is part of our territory" — 



