QUESTION SEVEN. 131 



It is to be kept clearly in view that at the time of the conclusion 

 of this treaty of 1818, and for twelve years afterward, no American 

 vessel had any right to enter any port of British North America with 

 the few exceptions named in the mutual arrangements of 1820 and 

 1823 hereinafter stated. The treaty of 1815, and the British laws 

 and policy, reserved the whole trade and intercourse with the ports 

 of these colonies to her own vessels, and reciprocally there was no 

 law or treaty of the United States which authorised the entry into 

 ports (with the exceptions stated) of the United States of British 

 vessels from British North American ports. 



Thus it was that the treaty of 1818 omitted to make any mention 

 of the ports in the British provinces in connection with the arrival 

 or departure of American vessels, either fishing or other, and so it 

 was a clear and necessary construction of the treaty of 1818 that the 

 arrangements, conditions, and renunciations therein provided had no 

 relation, one way or the other, to the exercise of what may be called 

 commercial rights by the American fishing or other vessels in the 

 waters or ports of British North America, for the status of things 

 was such that it could not be done in the case of any American vessel 

 without regard to her character as a vessel engaged in fishing upon 

 the high seas or in the British territorial waters, wherein, as was 

 provided, she might continue to fish, or to her commercial character. 

 (App., p. 437.) 



The right (except in the cases before stated) of the British to 



exclude such vessels and all others of the United States from her 



ports in British North America, as the matter stood until 1830, 



145 is fully conceded; and it is also conceded that during that 



time the only right of any vessel of the United States to enter 



the waters of British North America depended upon the treaty of 



1818 alone, and, in order to obtain the benefit of that treaty for such 



purposes, the American vessel must have been a fishing- vessel, and 



must have resorted to those particular waters for some one of the 



purposes mentioned in the treaty and no others. 



* * * * * * * 



In 1818, then, no American fishing-vessel or any other American 

 vessel could enter a port on any of the coasts of British North 

 America, even where the full right of fishing inshore existed. And 

 the treaty of 1818, formed on that basis, was not intended to, and it 

 did not in any way touch the question of any trade or commercial 

 right whatever, and of course made no distinction in these respects 

 between fishing and other American vessels. (App., p. 444.) 



A minority of the Senate Committee presented a separate report 

 which deserves consideration. They, too, agreed that, upon the treaty 

 of 1818, no right to commercial privileges could be based, and said : 



Can we ever hope to engraft on the treaty of 1818 any new agree- 

 ment for commercial privileges to our fishermen, without giving an 

 equivalent in some liberty or privilege that Great Britain will claim 

 for her fishermen? This question is answered by the fact that we 

 renounced in 1818 the best part of the fisheries that were of the 

 fruits of the war for independence in order to make the residue a 

 permanent right; and in 1854 and 1871 we agreed to pay heavily for 

 a temporary suspension of the restrictions and limitations of the 



