THIRTY-FIFTH DAY, JUNE 8^", 1893. 



Sir Charles Russell. — Mr. President, it is witli a sense of relief 

 tliat I liiid myself approaching the conchiding subject upon which it 

 will be uiy duty to address this TribunaL You, Sir, will have gathered 

 fi'om the arguments of my learned friends and myself that in our 

 apprehension of the questions with wliich the Tribunal has to deal, 

 this is the only one which deserves at tlie hands of this Tribunal seri- 

 ous consideration or which ought to give this Tribunal serious trouble. 

 I wish, at the outset, to explain the position which my argument takes 

 or proposes to take in the consideration of the general question. You, 

 Sir, will have observed that in presenting the Case upon what has been 

 called the questions of right, that I have had all along the most valu- 

 able and unstinted aid of my learned friend, Sir Richard Webster, and 

 my other learned friends who are with me, and with the assistance 

 which they were good enough to render to me, I took upon myself the 

 main burthen of presenting fully and at length the case on the part of 

 Great Britain relative to those questions of right. As regards the 

 question of Regulations, I propose only to address the Tribunal upon 

 some broad questions of xninciple which we submit ought to be borne 

 in mind by the Tribunal in considering the question of Regulations 

 and in deciding upon the plan which those Regulations should pursue. 

 In that view you will perceive, Mr. President, that it becomes neces- 

 sary at the very outset I should determine upon what hypothesis I am 

 to consider the question of Regulations. 



Am I to consider that question of Regulations as if the question of 

 right were undetermined ? Am I to consider the question of Regula- 

 tions as if the United States were to be supposed to have legal rights 

 such as are intended to be presented under the five questions of Article 

 VI, or am I to approach the question of Regulations upon the supposi- 

 tion that those questions have been determined adversely to the con- 

 tention of the United States? I need not tell you. Sir, what is the only 

 hypothesis upon which we can argue, or pretend to argue, the ques- 

 tion of Regulations at all. It is upon the hypothesis clearly and dis- 

 tinctly that this Tribunal has arrived or shall have arrived at the 

 determination that, so far as legal right is concerned, the United States 

 has none. I therefore shall argue tlie question as I conceive Article 7 

 of the Treaty contemplated that the Treaty, should be argued, naaiely, 

 upon the assumption tliat the United States has no legal property in 

 the fur seal individually or collectively, and, in the next place upon the 

 hypothesis that no right of the United States in regard to those indus- 

 tries so called upon the Islands is invaded by the pursuit of pelagic 

 sealing. The 7th Article, as I conceive, suggests that that is the con- 

 tingency contemplated by the Treaty itself it says: 



"If tlie determination of the fore.s^oing questions as to the exclusive jurisdic- 

 tion of the United States shall leave tlie subject in such position that the concur- 

 rence of Great Britain is necessary to the establishment of Eej^ulations for the 

 proper protection and preservation of the fur-seal in, or habitually resortinir to the 

 Behriu^ Sea, the Arbitrators shall then determine what concurrent Regulations", 

 and 80 forth, " are necessary." 



