ORAL ARGUMENT OF SIR CHARLES RUSSELL, Q. C. M. P. 137 

 Then the letter goes on : 



At that conference I talked over the matter with the two secretaries of state, and 

 brought fully to their view the substance of the instructions upon the ukase of 4th 

 September fast, insisting upon the necessity of this Government suspending the 

 execution of those regulations, which violate the general right of navigating within 

 the common jurisdiction of all nations, and declaring that the territorial pretension 

 advanced by Russia must be considered as entirely inadmissible by the United 

 States. — 



Theu follows the note verhale, which I need not trouble you with, 

 because the effect of it has already been disclosed in that discussion. 



We may now proceed further. On page 141 is an important despatch 

 from Mr. Adams to Mr. Middleton of the 22nd of July, 1823? 



Washington, July 22, 1823. 



Sik: I have the honor of inclosing herewith copies of a note from Baron de Tuyll, 

 the Russian minister, recently arrived, proposing, on the part of His Majesty the 

 Emperor of Russia, that a power should be transmitted to you to enter upon a nego- 

 tiation with the ministers of his Government concerning the differences which have 

 arisen from the Imperial ukase of 4th (16th) September, 1821, relative to the north- 

 west coast of America, and of the answer from this Department acceding to this 

 proposal. A full power is accordingly inclosed, and you will consider this letter as 

 communicating to you the President's instructions for the conduct of the negociatiou. 



From the tenor of the ukase, the pretentions of the Imperial Government extend 

 to an exclusive territorial jurisdiction from the forty-fifth degree of north latitude, 

 on the Asiatic coast, to the latitude of filty-one north on the western coast of the 

 American continent 



You see that is describing the circle I have mentioned — 



and they assume the right of interdicting the navigation and the fishery of all other 

 nations to the extent of 100 miles from the whole of that coast. 

 The United States can admit no part of these claims. 



I pause simply to put one question. Can any document be referred 

 to in which the United States ever receded from that position? There 

 is the distinct statement of the Secretary of State to the Minister at 

 St. Petersburgh — 



884 The United States can admit no part of these claims. 



Their right of navigation and of fishing is perfect, and has been in constant 

 exercise from the earliest times, after the peace of 1783, throughout the whole extent 

 of the Southern Ocean, subject only to the ordinary exceptions and exclusions of the 

 territorial jurisdictions, which, so far as iiussian rights are confined to certain islands 

 north of the fifty-fifth degree of latitude, and have no existence on the continent of 

 America. 



The correspondence between Mr. Poletica and this Department contained no dis- 

 cussion of the principles or of the facts upon which he attempted the justification of 

 the Imperial ukase. This was pnrjiosely avoided on our part, under the expectation 

 that the Imperial Government could not fail, upon a review of the measure, to revoke 

 it altogether. It did, however, excite much public animadversion in this country, 

 as the ukase itself had already done in England. I inclose herewith the North Amer- 

 ican Review for October, 1822, No. 37, which contains an article (p. 370) written by a 

 person fully master of the subject; and for the view of it taken in England I refer 

 you to the fifty-second number of the Quarterly Review, the article upcm Lieutenant 

 Kotzebne's voyages. From the article in the North American Review it will be seen 

 that the rights of discovery, of occupancy, and of uncontested possession, alleged by 

 Mr. Poletica, are all without foundation in fact. 



I have next to call your attention to page 142, on which will be found 

 an able argument by Mr. Adams directed mainly to the question of the 

 territorial limits claimed as regards the Southern boundary, etc. 



Next follows a justification of the traffic that was carried on by United 

 States citizens: a defence of that traffic as not being clandestine, etc. 



Then, on page 143, the last paragraph but two, after referring to 



