312 ORAL ARGUMENT OF CHRISTOPHER ROBINSON, Q. C. 



Wharton proposed it in its present form, saying lie was directed by tlie 

 President to propose it in that form, and he thought it woukl remove 

 Lord Salisbury's objection. 



Now the objection Lord Salisbury had taken was, and was only, that 

 that question seemed to attribute some abnormal rights to the United 

 States arising out of Bussian claims, which he said it ought not to do; 

 but instead of altering it only to meet that objection, it was in other 

 respects altered, and for the tirst time these words, "inlor habitually 

 resorting to Behring Sea" were introduced, which for the first time, 

 gave ground for the contention that the regulations were intended to 

 extend beyond Behring Sea. Why that was done I do not know 

 exactly. I have gone through it with the greatest care, and can only 

 point out this to the Tribunal — it would take too long to go into it 

 minutely again, but it has arisen in this way. There were negotiations 

 going on together for three different things; first, for the settlement of 

 the questions to be referred, all of which had been settled except ques- 

 tion 6. Then, a negotiation going on for a modus; and at the sauie time 

 negotiations for the appointment of a comniission. What you find is 

 that these three negotiations were all going on together from about 

 April, 1891, and if you trace, as I have done, the course which those 

 negotiations took, and trace the various letters which were written in 

 the course of them, these changes would seem to have arisen from let- 

 ters written in May 1891. Perhaj^s, if 1 give you the i)ages of the book, 

 without either reading them myself or troubling you to read them now, 

 those who desire to follow this liistory, so to speak, and the genesis of 

 this clause, will be able to do so without difficulty, and to jmrsue an 

 enquiry which can only be pursued by reading these things and spell- 

 ing them out for yourselves. The pages are 305 and 319, and if you 

 look at our Appendix Volume 3, number 3, 1892, page 52, you will see 

 what is not to be found in the United States volume, and the only 

 thing which is not to be found there — the acceptance by Lord Salis- 

 bury, on the 0th July, of this question in the form in which it was pro- 

 posed by Mr. Wharton on the 25th June. 



Then the other letters to which 1 refer are to be found at pages 299 

 of the same Volume, namely Volume I of the United States Apijendix; 

 and pages 302; 303; 304 and 305; 306; 307; 308; 309; 310; 311; 312; 

 314; 315, and 316. At those pages you will find the history of this 

 matter; and also at page 319. Those, I think, are the pages which will 

 give you the whole history of this. 



Then, at page 350, are letters which I think have been already referred 

 to by the Attorney General in his argument. There is a great tempta- 

 tion to one who has spelt these out to try and explain them ; but I do 

 not think it can be satisfactorily explained in the course of an argument, 

 because it requires one to spell out these letters for oneself one after the 

 other and to see if from them you can arrive at the way in which this 

 limitation came to be made. One thing is certain; as late as the 15th 

 of January, 1892, in those instructions given to the Arbitrators, you 

 find that this agreement for a Commission was intended to be separate; 

 but it got into the Treaty because it was considered undesirable to have 

 two diifereut documents to pass through the Senate, and so they came 

 together. 



Senator Morgan. — How is that? 



Mr. Robinson. — You will find as late as the 15th of January, 1892, 

 this was in the form of a separate document, and the explanation given 

 was that it was thought uiulesirable to put two documents through the 

 Senate, and, therefore, they incorporated it into the Treaty. That is 



