British jurisdiction without an equivalent. There is, as you 

 remember, in the third article of the treaty of 1783, a diversity of 

 expression by which the general fisheries on the Banks are ac 

 knowledged as our right, but these fishing privileges within the 

 British jurisdiction, are termed liberties. The British govern 

 ment consider the latter as franchises forfeited ipao facto by the 

 war, and declared they would not grant them anew without an equi 

 valent. Aware that by this principle they, too, had forfeited their 

 right to navigate the Mississippi, recognised in the same treaty of 

 1 783, they now demanded a new provision to secure it to them again* 



&quot; We were instructed not to suffer our right to the fisheries to be 

 brought into discussion ; we had no authority to admit any discri 

 mination between the first and the last parts of the third article of 

 the treaty of 1783. No power to offer or agree to an equivalent 

 either for the rights or the liberties. I considered both as stand 

 ing on the same footing : both as the continuance of franchises al 

 ways enjoyed, and the difference in the expressions only as arising 

 from the operation of our change from the condition of British 

 subjects to that of a sovereign people, upon an object in one part of 

 general, and in the other of special, jurisdiction. The special ju 

 risdiction had been that of our own sovereign : by the revolution 

 and the treaty of peace, it became a foreign, but still remained a 

 special, jurisdiction. By the very same instrument in whi&amp;lt;;h we 

 thus acknowledged it as a foreign* jurisdiction, we reserved to our 

 selves with the full assent of its sovereign, and without any limitation, 

 of time or of events, the franchise which we had ahvays enjoyed 

 while the jurisdiction had been our own. 



&quot; It was termed & liberty because it was a freedom to be enjoyed 

 within a special jurisdiction ; the fisheries on the Banks were 

 termed rights because they were to be enjoyed on the ocean, the 

 common jurisdiction of all nations ; but there was nothing in the 

 terms themselves and nothing in the article or in the treaty imply 

 ing an intention or expectation of either of the contracting parties, 

 that one, more than the other, should be liable to forfeiture by a 

 subsequent war. On the maturest deliberation I still hoid this ar 

 gument to be sound, and it is to my mind the only one by which 

 our claim to the fisheries within British jurisdiction can be main 

 tained. But after the declaration made by the British government, 

 it was not to be expected that they would be converted to this 

 opinion without much discussion, which was forbidden to us, and 

 the result of this must have been very doubtful upon minds at all 

 times inclined, and at this time most peculiarly prone, rather to 

 lean upon power than to listen to reason. We stated the genera 1 ; 

 principle in one of our notes to the British plenipotentiaries, as 

 the ground upon which our government deemed no new stipulation 

 necessary to secure the enjoyment of all our rights and liberties 

 in the fisheries. They did not answer that part of our note; but 

 they came to ask a stipulation for the right of British subjects 



