54 ARGUMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



VI. 



NO CONSENT OF NATIONS TO PRINfTPLE OF RIGHT 

 CLAIMED BY UNITED STATES. 



Finally, it is submitted on this branch of the United 

 States Argument, that there is not shown to be any con- 

 sent of nations to any proposition wliich would warrant 

 the United States claim to the right of protection or 

 property, now for the first time advanced. 



The United States endeavour further to support their 

 contention by a reference to certain other extra territorial 

 laws not connected with tisheries which have been passed 

 by other nations. They state — 



TJnitcd States Reference may also be made to the British Hovering Acts, the St. 

 Case, p. 237. Helena Act of 1815, and the Quarantine Act of 1825. 



The '•'■Hovering Acts.''^ 



These Acts have been passed to prevent smuggling. They 

 establish a practice which has hitlierto been acquiesced in 

 both by Great Britain and the United States, but they afford 

 no analogy, either in fact or in principle, to the United States 

 claim in the present case. 



In the first place, it will be observed that the Hovering 

 Laws do not extend the limit of territorial waters, or assert 

 any general claim of dominion over an area of the sea 

 61 beyond the ordinary 3-mile limit, such as is asserted 

 by the United States over the waters of Behring Sea 

 east of a certain line. They simply claim to exercise a 

 special jurisdiction over certain vessels at a comparatively 

 small distance outside the usual limit, in order to prevent or 

 punish otfences against the jurisdiction within that limit, to 

 which such vessels are accomplices. 



And in the case of a British vessel which was seized in 

 1890 by a Russian cruizer, on the ground that she was seal- 

 fishing within Kussiaii territorial waters, Her Majesty's 

 Government were of oi)inion that even if the vessel at 

 the time of her seizure was herself outside the 3-mile terri- 

 torial limit, the fact that she was, by means of her boats, 

 carrying on fishing within Russian waters without the pre- 

 scribed licence precluded them from remonstrating against 

 the seizure. 



But no such conduct has been alleged against the Brit- 

 ish vessels seized by the United States. They were not 

 hovering at sea, they were not lying to with intent to pro- 

 ceed to the territory, or the territorial waters of the United 

 States, with intent to assist others in breaking the law 

 there. No such grounds have ever been alleged for the 

 seizure of the British vessels. The claim of the United 

 States is to include the right to seize such vessels within 

 their general jurisdiction over Behring Sea, and the anal- 

 ogy of the Hovering Laws cannot be adduced in support 

 of such a claim. 



Moreover, even if such analogy existed, the consent, or 

 acquiescence, of other nations, which exists in the case of 

 the ''Hovering Acts" (so long as the jurisdiction is exer- 

 cised within reasonable limits), is wanting to the claim of 



