314 ORAL ARGUMENT OP HON. EDWARD J. PHELPS. 



j\Ir. Phelps. — I am fortunately not charged with the conduct of their 

 diplomacy. 



iSir Charles Russell. — And my learned friend has already con- 

 demned or written the epitaph of diplomacy. 



Mr. Phelps. — If the British Government had the infornjation on 

 which these charges are founded and the llussians had not, it is evident 

 that the Kussians have yet something to learn on the subject of pelagic 

 sealing; and in making those arrangements they will possibly verify 

 an old proverb, which does not belong to diplomacy, which is " the more 

 haste the less speed." What we have to do with it is to show the value 

 of this 30 mile zone. Now reduce the 30-mile zone to 20, and see of 

 these 219 seals how many would be left inside. 



In leaving this — and 1 must not dwell on it, because a demonstration 

 in mathematics cannot be added to by being talked about — a paper has 

 been laid before you which 1 have shown my learned friends on the other 

 side, containing certain extracts froiii evidence — nothing more I believe, 

 as to a fact which has been spoken of in this case by some witnesses as 

 tending to show that the female seals did not go out to obtain food — the 

 condition of things on the rookeries — 1 will ask attention to the evidence 

 there copied. 1 shall not say anything about it; it is evidence in con- 

 tradiction of that suggestion. 



Now, is it possible that Eegulations of this character, a 20-mile zone 

 round the Pribilof Islands, when nine-tenths of the seals are taken out- 

 side it, and a time limited between the 15th of September and the first 

 of the following July, when no sealing at all would be done in Behring 

 Sea if there were no time limit, is to be the result of the high-sounding 

 and constantly repeated statement on tlie part of Great Britain all 

 through this diplomatic correspondence, that they were ready to join 

 and to do everything that is necessary for the protection of the seals'? 

 Is that the result of the language of this Treaty in the Article that has 

 been so often read ? Is it a compliance with the language 1 Is it ottered 

 as a compliance with it? Is it at all in conformity with the instructions 

 which that Government as well as ours gave to the Commissioners who 

 ought to have settled the question and would have settled the ([uestion 

 if both sides had addressed themselves to it; and if it had not turned 

 out that one side was addressing itself to the question of what is 

 necessary, and the other side was addressing itself to the business 

 of l)reserving at all hazards, and in every possible way, and not only 

 preserving but increasing, the business of pelagic sealing? 



A few words in respect to the Pegnlations that have been submitted 

 by the United States. If the prohibition of pelagic sealing is not 

 necessary to the preservation of the seal, then there would be no war- 

 rant for adopting such Eegulations. We do not, for one moment, 

 claim and have never claimed that anything should be done here to 

 imi^rove or benefit the business of the United States in this indus- 

 try, to give them a monopoly, or anything else. That is not necessary 

 for the preservation of the race. There is where the authority of this 

 Tribunal stops. There is where the reason of it stops, and we should 

 not for a moment be consciously guilty of asking for a regulation that 

 is not necessary for that purpose, even though it might be indirectly, 

 somehow or other beneficial to the profits of this industry, witli which 

 we have no more to do, in my judgment, than we have in preserving 

 the profits of pelagic sealing. Wliy, then, do we propose to prohibit 

 it? Because on this evidence it is demonstrated that it cannot exist, 

 to a degree that would induce anybody to engage in it, without exter- 

 minating the race. I do not say that you may take no females out of 



