QUESTION ONE. 33 



2. Some of such regulations are (Ante, p. 35) - 

 within the reasonable province of local civil jurisdiction. 



3. Those that are within the " province of local civil jurisdiction " 

 are those which do not modify or affect "the engagements of the 

 treaty." 



4. If (Ante, p. 32) 



the Newfoundland legislature have the right of binding Americans 

 who fish within their waters by any laws which do not contravene 

 existing treaties, it must be further conceded that the duty of deter- 

 mining the existence of such contraventions must be undertaken by 

 the Governments, and cannot be remitted to the judgment of each 

 individual fisherman. 



It is not pretended that, in his letters, Mr. Evarts says nothing 

 inconsistent with these admissions, or, indeed, contradictory of them. 

 But it is contended that Mr. Evarts so admitted, and that these ad- 

 missions cover the point now in controversy. For Mr. Evarts' lan- 

 guage suffices to show that 



MR. EVARTS. 



37 (1.) The liberty accorded by the treaty was an ordered and 



regulated liberty, and not an unlimited licence. 

 (2.) It was one which was to be subject to such laws as were 



within the reasonable province of local civil jurisdiction. 



(3.) And such laws would, therefore, not modify or affect "the 

 engagements of the treaty ; " but, on the contrary, would be a fulfil- 

 ment of it. Would not the United States have had fair ground of 

 complaint if the United Kingdom had failed to do that which was 

 essential for the preservation of the fisheries, fisheries in which the 

 United States were interested, but which they themselves could not 

 protect ? 



LORD SALISBURY'S DESPATCH, 1880. 



Reliance has been placed by the Government of the United States 

 upon some expression in Lord Salisbury's despatch of the 3rd April, 

 1880, which refers to the fact that American fishermen took the rights 

 conferred by the treaty subject to any restrictions upon British fish- 

 ermen which existed at the date of the treaty. It is, however, sub- 

 mitted that Lord Salisbury's despatch, read as a whole, contains no 

 admission that regulations with regard to the exercise of the fishing 

 could not be passed by the British or Colonial legislatures subsequent 

 to the treaty. Confirmation of this is to be found in the passages 

 which have been already quoted from the letter of Lord Salisbury to 

 Mr. Welsh of the 7th November, 1878. (Ante, p. 32.) 



