ORAL ARGUMENT OF JAMES C. CARTER, ESQ. 125 



Art. III. It is agreed that no settlement shall he made hereafter on the northwest 

 roast of America hy citizens of the United States or under their authority, uonh, 

 nor by Russiiin subjects, or under the authority of Russia, south of the tifty-fifth 

 degree of north latitude. 



(For other inclosures, see American State Papers, Foreign Relations, vol. v, pp. 

 436-438.) 



Now the learned Arbitrators will perceive from that letter, which is 

 very instructive in reference to the views of the United States Govern- 

 ment at that time, that the only serious and practical objection on the 

 part of the United States to whatever pretensions were set up by 

 Eiissia in this Ukase of 1.S21, were two : first, that she should have 

 extended her territorial pretensions from 54° 40', where they stood 

 under the charter to the Kussian American Company of 1799, down to 

 51 degrees of North latitude; and, second, to her exclusion from the 

 Northwest coast of United States citizens engaged in trade; in other 

 words, the exclusion of them from the benefits of the trade on this North- 

 west coast. The maritime pretension contained in the Ukase of 1821 

 was indeed alluded to and objected to; but it forms no substantial part 

 of the objections which are so carefully urged by Mr. Adams. 



The substance of the objections urged by Mr. Adams are these: that 

 the trade along this Northwest coast, by which he menus the coast 

 extending from, say 00 degrees of north latitude, down to the mouth 

 of the Columbia River, had been for years in the enjoyment of various 

 powers, of Russia, of the United States, of Great Britain, of Spain and 

 of Portugal; that they had all, to a greater or less degree, engaged in 

 that trade; that the United States had engaged in it from the time 

 that she had become an independent nation; and that her right to a 

 l)articipation in that trade was entirely well founded, as Mr. Adams 

 insisted. Now, that had reference to this coast along which I run the 

 pointer [indicating on the map], and had no reference at all to Bering- 

 Sea, or to any of the islands of Bering Sea, or to the coast of Siberia — 

 regions which, so far as respected their coasts, or any trading upon 

 the coasts, had never been visited by the vessels of the United States; 

 and no thought had ever been entertained of engaging in such a com- 

 merce. The United States claimed title, according to this statement 

 by Mr. Adams, up to the 59th degree, the present boundary of British 

 Columbia. At that time Great Britain and the United States were of 

 course in dispute as to whom this coast here (indicating on map) 

 belonged to; and it was not until the year 1846 that that dispute was 

 settled by the adoption of the present boundary. 



The President. On page 142 of the report of Mr. Adams from 

 which you have just read, they speak of the 59th degree north as being 

 the claim of the United States. I suppose it is a misprint. 



Mr. Carter. No, that is the i)oint up to which the United States 

 claimed. It would be where my jjointer now is, up to the southern 

 boundary of Alaska, a line whicli would take the whole of the peninsula. 



That was a claim which made this territory in part a disputed one. 

 The case which Mr. Adams made here by these instructions was this: 

 "Spain is the first discoverer up to the 60th degree of North latitude. 

 We have her rights transferred to us. Therefore by first discovery, 

 we have a title to latitude 60. In the next place we have always 

 engaged in trade on that coast; have visited it continually ever since 

 we were an independent nation, and such rights as we have springing 

 out of trade with the coast, added to the rights of prior discovery, con- 

 stitute a title upon which we can make a dispute with Russia". 



So that we may see from this letter of Mr. Adams, and from his 

 instructions to the American negotiator of the Treaty, that practically 



