124 ARGUMENTS ON PRELIMINARY MOTIONS. 



The President. — The word does not occur, but the meaning does. 



Mr. Carter. — No. lUit I have dealt with the uieaninj;' there. I am 

 now deahng with the argument of my learned Iriends upon the other 

 side based upon this word ''contingency", and what that means, and I 

 think I have now succeeded in showing, at all events to my own satis- 

 faction, and as far as I can, to the satisfaction of the learned Arbitra- 

 tors, that the "contingency" mentioned in Article IX of the Treaty is 

 the contingency that there should be any Arbitration at all. 



I must make one moditication of that: — "the contingency that there 

 should be any Arbitration at all " upon the subject of Eights or Regu- 

 lations, In the course of the negotiation, Great Britain had made 

 claims for damages, and provisions were inserted in the Treaty on that 

 score, and it might still be necessary, as those were in reference to past 

 occurrences, and would not be settled by the establishment of Regula- 

 tions for the future — it might still be necessary for the Arbitration to 

 discharge its functions and to be called together upon the question of 

 damages, but upon that question alone. 



Now then, to sum up a little the substance of this debate — what has 

 been the contention of Great Britain on this subject? At the start, 

 they began with the interpretation that all evidence in respect of Reg- 

 ulations, at least, and, as they say, all evidence in relation to seal life, 

 was not admissible until after a decision by the A-rbitrators adverse to 

 the claims of the United States in respect to the questions of exclusive 

 jurisdiction, and that it was not until that decision was made that any 

 evidence would be competent or admissible in relation to seal lite, and 

 that, therefore, any submission of evidence in relation to seal life in the 

 Case by either party was irregular, not allowed by the Treaty — a thing 

 which they protested against, and reserved their right to move the 

 Tribunal to strike out. 



That was their attitude, and the explanatory note of Lord Rosebery 

 in reference to that was in answer to the suggestions from the Govern- 

 ment of the United States that this provided no method by which 

 either party could answer tlie allegations of the other in respect to the 

 most important part of the controversy. His answer to that was: 

 "That is a method of procedure "; and the intimation was that it was 

 for the Tribunal itself to regulate it; so that after it had come to its 

 decision upon these questions of exclusive jurisdiction and found it 

 necessary to enquire into the question of concurrent regulations, it 

 would then establish some system of procedure by which the ])arties 

 would be apprised of the evidence relied upon by each other, and be 

 able to meet it, making necessary a new hearing and a new decision. 

 That was their first position. The main features of it are still asserted 

 by Counsel on the other side; but the absurdity of supposing that 

 there are to be two hearings, two submissions of evidence, two decisions, 

 and two awards, has struck my learned friend. Sir Charles Russell so 

 forcibly that he has been obliged to retire from that, and he says, if I 

 correctly understood him in tlie course of his argument, that there is 

 to be no such thing — there is not to be a decisio}i^ but he insists that 

 the evidence still is not admissible, until the Tribunal has determined 

 that it must enter upon the question of regulations, but that determi- 

 nation it is not necessary to evidence by a judgment, or by a decision, 

 but by an intimation — that was the word, I think, — by an " intimation". 



Sir Charles Russell. — An intimation of a determination. 



Mr. Carter. — Yes, by "an intimation of a determiimtion" an inti- 

 mation that it had reached such and such a determination. 



Now you will have observed all through this debate on the part of 

 the Counsel for Great Britain that there is an assumption that this 



