DECISIONS OF UNITED STATES COURTS. 117 



Siberia was awakeDecl by the accounts given of tlie industries that 

 might be created and the innumerable fur-bearing animals which in- 

 habited the waters and islands iu and adjaceut to what is now known 

 as Bering Sea. Owing to a conflict of interests, disorder, and a wanton 

 destruction of seal life in the waters and on the islands of the new dis- 

 coveries, an im])erial ukase was issued bearing date of December 27, 

 1799, by which the right of fishing, hunting and trading was conferred 

 upon what was designated the " Eussian American Comi:)any." In the 

 ukase of that date Eussia asserted a distinct claim, by right of discov- 

 ery, to the western part of America, beginning from the fifty-fifth de- 

 gree of north latitude, and of the chain of islands extending from 

 Kamtchatka to the north to America and southward to Japan. Author- 

 ity was also given to the company to have exclusive use of all hun ting- 

 grounds and establishments then existing on the northeastern (west- 

 ern) coast of America, from the fifty-fifth degree of north latitude to 

 Bering Straits, and also on the Aleutian, Kurile, and other islands sit- 

 uated on the northeastern ocean, and to make new discoveries not only 

 north of the fifty-fifth degree of north latitude, but farther to the south, 

 and to occupy the new lands discovered as Eussian possessions. It 

 will be observed from the foregoing that Eussia claimed the exclusive 

 right and dominion of the Sea of Kamtchatka, now known as Bering- 

 Sea, by right of discovery, and for the further reason that the sea was 

 bounded by Eussia's Asiatic coast on the west, to Bering Straits on tlie 

 north, and on the American continent as far east as British possessiojts, 

 and south to 54° 40' north latitude, and was essentially landlocked by 

 Eussian territory. 



Now, in relation to this question of title acquired by discovery, our 

 own court of last resort has held, in the case of Johnson v. Mcintosh 

 (8 Wheat., 572), Marshall, 0. J., delivering the opinion, that, " On the 

 discovery of this immense continent the great nations of Europe were 

 eager to appropriate to themselves so much of it as they could ac- 

 quire. * * * But as they were all in pursuit of nearly the same ob- 

 ject, it was necessary, in order to avoid conflicting settlements and 

 subsequent war with each other, to establish a principle which all 

 should acknowledge as the law by which the right of acquisition which 

 they all asserted, should be regulated as between themselves. This 

 principle was, that the discovery gave title to the Government by 

 whose subjects, or by whose authority it was made, against all other 

 European governments, which title might be consummated by posses- 

 sion. The exclusion of all other Europeans necessarily gave to the 

 nation making the discovery the sole right of acquiring the soil from 

 the natives, and establishing settlements upon it. It was a right with 

 which no European could interfere. It was a right which all asserted 

 for themselves, and to the assertion of which by others all assented." 

 * * * (See Wharton's Digest International Law, Vol. 1, § 2.) 



Chancellor Kent says : "All that can be reasonably asserted is, that 

 the dominion of the sovereign of the shore over the contiguous sea 

 extends as far as is requisite for his safety and for some lawful end." 

 (First Kent's Commentaries, p. 28.) 



Vattel says: "A nation may appropriate to herself those things of 

 which the free and common use would be prejudicial or dangerous to her. 

 This is a second reason for which governments extend their dominion 

 over the sea along their coasts, as far as they are able to protect their 

 rights." (See Vattel's Law of Nations, 127.) 



Supplementing the principle enunciated by Chief Justice Marshall 

 sujjra with the rule as stated by Kent and Vattel, can there longer 



