DESPATCHES, EEPOETS, CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 741 



of Miramichi; (3) Egmont Bay; (4) St. Ann's Bay; (5) Fortune 

 Bay; (6) Sir Charles Hamilton Sound: (7) Barrington Bay; (8) 

 Chedabucto Bay; (9) Mira Bay; (10) Placentia Bay; (11) St. 

 Mary's Bay. 



These agreements contained in article 4 of the treaty, as has been 

 said, really cede (so far as the United States are concerned) to Great 

 Britain forever the complete dominion over these numerous and, for 

 fishing purposes, the most valuable of the bays along the coasts of 

 British North America, and exclude forever all the American fishing 

 vessels therefrom, except for the limited and narrow purposes men- 

 tioned in the treaty of 1818, and recognise that by force of the treaty 

 of 1818 these are and always have been British waters, while it is 

 thought by the committee that by the public law of nations these 

 same waters will be open to the vessels of all other countries than our 

 own, unless they, too, shall, from generosity or fear, or for some con- 

 sideration, renounce their right to use the same. 



The principle on which this article is formed is a recognition by 

 the United States of the municipal and territorial sovereignty of 

 Great Britain in and over all the other bays, etc., on the British 

 North American coast, however large, in which, by this treat} 7 , our 

 citizens are to be admitted to fish, exterior to a line 3 miles from 

 shore. 



The article in terms professes to delimit the British bays mentioned 

 in the treaty of 1818, and as it mentions eleven such bays even 

 more than 10 miles wide, and some of which are 20 or more miles 

 wide, it follows that the British contention of municipal dominion 

 over all bays without regard to width, is acted upon, and that the 

 right of Americans to fish in the few other wide bays not mentioned 

 is a grant by the British Government. 



If the Baie de Chaleurs is a now British bay, so also must be the 

 Bay of Fundy and all the rest. But if it be suggested that the 

 " plenipotentiaries " renounced the right of fishing in these bays as 

 public waters (for which no hint appears in the treaty) in 

 444 consideration of supposed advantages gained to the United 

 States by other provisions of the treaty, it is, the committee 

 thinks, equally objectionable; and this entirely without regard to 

 any present practical value or want of value of the fisheries therein. 

 It is not thought by the committee to be suitable to the dignity or 

 interests of the United States to renounce the right of its citizens to 

 pursue business in any part of the public waters of the world. Such 

 rights, the committee thinks, should neither be the subjects of pur- 

 chase, sale, barter, nor gift. 



The question of the extent of territorial dominion, as it respects 

 the exercise of fishing rights in bays more than 6 miles wide in- 

 denting the shores of a country, must of course be determined by the 

 law and practice of nations as they existed in the year 1818, at which 

 time, as the committee thinks, the 3-miles limit from shores was rec- 

 ognized without regard to large indenting bays, except under very 

 peculiar circumstances, such as the prescriptive exercise of domin- 

 ion, etc. Whether, in view of recent inventions in the implements of 

 warfare, it may not be politic for maritime nations to agree upon an 

 enlargement of the boundaries of their territorial dominion seaward 

 is a question well worthy of consideration, but it has no place in 

 respect of the matters now in hand. 



