OKAL ARGUMENT OF JAMES C. CARTER, ESQ. 77 



call, he thought, questions of right, and that they were questions of 

 right whicli must be decided by the members of this Tribunal asju7Hsts. 

 I concur in that view of those questions thus taken by him and antici- 

 pate, indeed, tliat it will never be receded from by him. How else 

 could it be? Tliis is called au arhitraWm; but very plainly it is not 

 an arbitration of that character Avliich very frequently takes place 

 between man and man. Oftentimes in controversies between individ- 

 uals it is of tar higher importance that the particular dispute should be 

 in some manner settled and the parties left at peace, than hoic it shall 

 be settled; and therefore in such cases the decision is often reached by 

 some reciprocal process of concession, giving a little on one side and 

 conceding a little on the other, and so on, until liually an agreemeut 

 is reached Avithout a resort to any particular i^rinciple. That is not 

 the way to deal with this controversy. It is of a totally dift'ereiit char- 

 acter. If it could have been disposed of by mutual compromise and 

 concession it would never have been brought to this Arbitration. The 

 parties themselves could have settled it. They are quite competeut 

 to say how much they will be willing to yield, in order, by mutual 

 compromise and concession, to finally reach a point upon which they 

 can agree. But the difliculty in this case is that the parties were in 

 difference in respect to their rujhts, and they could never come to an 

 agreement upon them. They differed as to the question of the powers 

 a nation may exercise upon the high seas in defence of its admitted 

 rights of property in time of peace. Tliey differed on the question 

 whether the United States has a property interest in these seals, and 

 in the industry which has been carried on in respect to them on the 

 Pribilof Islands. Those differences they have never been able to recon- 

 cile. At variance with each other in respect to them at the start, 

 subsequent discussion between the two parties has had the effect only 

 of more widely separating them; and it is that controversy upon those 

 questions of right Avhich they have committed to your decision. 



The constitution of this Tribunal also imports that the questions are 

 those of right. Why should a tribunal have been called together con- 

 stituted of eminent jurists from several distinct nations unless it was 

 intended that the rules of right should be applied"? Why should pro- 

 vision have been made for counsel supposed to be learned in the law, 

 and learned in the fundamental principles upon which the law is 

 founded, unless it was supposed necessary to bring before the tribunal 

 considerations of right in order to enable its members to make a deci- 

 sion. Indeed, how could counsel address this Tribunal unless it was 

 supposed that there was a standard of right, acknowledged both by it 

 and the counsel who address it, to which the latter couhl appeal and 

 upon which they could endeavor to pursuade the Tribunal? It is there- 

 fore very clear, as it seems to me, that the decision of this Tribunal is 

 to be governed by some rule such as we understand to be a rule of right. 

 Any other rule, I assume, would not be satisfactory to eitlier party. It 

 certainly would not be satisfactory to the United vStates. I think I 

 may safely say that, however valuable this seal herd may be to the 

 Government and to the people of the United States, a decision affirm- 

 ing their full and exclusive right to it made by this Tribunal, unless it 

 were made upon grounds of right, would not be acceptable. It is of 

 far greater importance to the United States, as it must be to every 

 nation, that the decision of any controversies to which it may be a 

 party should be determined u})on princii)les of right, than it is to gain 

 any mere temporary advantage not based upon such princix)les. 



