322 APPENDIX TO BRITISH CASE. 



Now, Sir, can we, in any event, yield our right to navigate the Gut 

 of Canso, and with it the fisheries of the Straits of Northumberland ? 

 No ! Can we enjoy our fisheries as we ought while these disputes 

 exist ? No ! Are we to leave them open and if so, shall our fisheries 

 be carried on hereafter under the surveillance of an armed British 

 squadron, and the guardianship of a naval fleet of our own ? 



The indications are abundant that it is the wish of the Senate that 

 the Executive should not treat upon this subject, and I think wisely. 

 I agree on that point with my honourable and distinguished friend 

 from Massachusetts, [Mr. DAVIS] . What the Colonies require is some 

 modification of commercial regulations which may affect the revenue. 

 That is a subject proper to be acted upon by Congress, not by the 

 President, if it is to be acted upon at all. It must not be done by 

 treaty. We seem to have courted the responsibility, and it rests upon 

 us. Let us no longer excite ourselves and agitate the country with 

 unavailing debates; but let us address ourselves to the relief of the 

 fishermen, and to the improvement of our commerce. 



Now, Sir, there is only one way that Congress can act, and that is 

 by reciprocal legislation with the British Parliament or the British 

 Colonies of some sort. I commit myself to no particular scheme or 

 project of reciprocal legislation, and certainly to none injurious to 

 any agricultural or manufacturing interest. I, for one, will give my 

 poor opinion upon the subject, and it is this: That so long hereafter 

 as any British force shall be maintained in those northeastern waters, 

 an equal naval force must be maintained there by ourselves. When 

 Great Britain shall diminish or withdraw her armed force, we ought 

 to diminish or withdraw our own ; and that in the meantime, a com- 

 mission ought to be raised, or that some appropriate Committee of 

 this body the Committee on Foreign Relations, the Committee on 

 Finance, or the Committee on Commerce should be charged to ascer- 

 tain whether there cannot be some measure adopted by reciprocal 

 legislation to adjust these difficulties and enlarge the rights of our 

 fishermen, consistently with all the existing interests of the United 

 States. 



No. 106. 1858, August 15; Letter from Commander Campbell to 

 Vice- Admiral Seymour. 



H.M.SS. DEVASTATION Pictou 15 Aug 1352. 



SIB : I beg to inform you that in consequence of the extraordinary 

 determination evinced by the American fishermen to encroach upon 

 the shores of the Bay of Chaleur I left the pinnace of this sloop at 

 Port Daniell, under Lieutenant Newport, from 3rd. to 13 inst., to 

 keep them in check. Altho' the Americans have never (on being 

 warned out of that bay by me) asserted their right to be there I fear 

 an idea has arisen among them that such is the case, & I have deemed 

 it my duty, in consequence, clearly to point out that the Treaty of 

 1818, excludes them from all bays on this part of the coast, except 

 for the purposes thereon specified 



The doubt has arisen from the fact of the fishing having been 

 carried on by those people, in defiance, of the Treaty, in former years, 

 in consequence of the vessel of war having so much ground to go over 



