SPHERE OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 



35 



Mexico for the protection of fisheries off the California coast 

 in 1926 but abrogated it a year later. 8 



In instances where the citizens of a number of nations 

 are engaged in taking some species of wild life on the high 

 seas, agreements between individual governments are not 

 effective. A general all inclusive agreement must be ar- 

 ranged. An example of one treaty of that type is the Baleen 

 Whale Convention drafted under the auspices of the League 

 of Nations, regulating the taking of the baleen whale. 9 It 

 was ratified by some half-dozen other nations as well as the 

 United States. 



Protection of Migratory Birds under Treaty-Making 

 Clause: The exercise of the treaty-making power of the 

 national government was not questioned so long as it con- 

 cerned the conservation of animals ferae naturae on the 

 high seas. A new point was raised, however, by the at- 

 temped regulation of the killing of migratory birds, that is, 

 the game and song birds that migrate seasonally between 

 Canada and the United States, by the national government 

 under the treaty clause. This type of regulation was dis- 

 tinguished from the previous ones by the fact that the ani- 

 mals ferae naturae to whom the earlier treaties referred had 

 been beyond the boundaries of any state while here the mi- 

 gratory birds were found within the states which up until 

 this time had looked upon them as entirely subject to state 

 jurisdiction. 



8 Treaty Series, No. 732. 



9 On Baleen Whale Convention see article by Jessup, Philip C, " The 

 International Protection of Whales," Journal of International Law, vol. 

 24, P- 75i (1930), American ratification July 7, 1932; for more general 

 discussion of whaling see Hearings on Conservation of Whales, Senate 

 Committee on the Conservation of Wild Life Resources, March 20, 1931, 

 Hohman, Elmer, The American Whaleman, New York (1928) and Star- 

 buck, Alexander, History of the American Whaling Industry, Waltham, 

 Mass. (1878). 



