130 CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



matter, and the basis of all the provisions that have entered into that 

 treaty. It is not a restriction of commerce at all; it is an enlarge- 

 ment of mere fishing rights under the very limited allowance of 

 shelter and repairs and procuring wood. 



UNITED STATES SENATE, 1888. 



A second report was issued by the Senate Committee on the 7th 

 May, 1888. A large part of it was devoted to proving (App., 

 p. 435)- 



1. That at the date of the treaty (1818) no American vessels of 

 any kind (with certain unimportant exceptions) had any right of 

 admission for any purposes into British waters or ports. 



2. That the renunciation in the treaty, therefore, applied to fishing- 

 vessels the only vessels that could have had any pretence of a claim 

 of entry. 



3. That the treaty " had no relation, one way or the other, to the 

 exercise of what may be called commercial rights." 



4. That " the right of the British to exclude " all American vessels 

 " from he*' ports in British North America, as the matter stood until 

 1830, is fully conceded." 



Some extracts from the report may be useful (App., p. 436) : 



The commercial treaty concluded on the 3rd July, 1815, between the 



two countries provided for reciprocal liberty of commerce between 



all the territories of Great Britain in Europe and the terri- 



144 tories of the United States, but left without any new treaty, 



stipulation or obligation, commercial intercourse between 



British dominions in North America and the United States remaining 



under the exclusive control of each. 



******* 



It will be observed that the ancient right continued in all its force 

 in every bay, harbour, and creek of a described territory, and that 

 the renunciation of the right to fish on other coasts, bays, harbours, 

 and creeks is in the same language, and is perfectly correlative to 

 the first, and that the line of British Municipal Dominion was recog- 

 nised and stated to be a line 3 marine miles from these British coasts, 

 bays, creeks, and harbours, and that this renunciation was, both in 

 substance and form, a renunciation only of a right to fish and to 

 exercise the incidents of the fishing, as drying, &c., and that the 

 proviso to that renunciation admitted the American fishermen to 

 enter such waters, bays, and harbours for the specific purposes neces- 

 sary to them in their character as fishermen only, and not having the 

 slightest reference, either expressly or by implication, to any fishing 

 or other vessel of the United States, and sailing under their flag, 

 entering any port of His Majesty's Dominions anywhere for any 

 commercial or trading purpose. (App., p. 436.) 



Congressional Record, vol. xviii, p. 941. 



