830 APPENDIX TO BRITISH CASE. 



nationality of the crews employed in the vessels through which the 

 Treaty right has been exercised. 



The language of the Treaty of 1818 was taken from the Illrd 

 Article of the Treaty of 1783. The Treaty made at the same time 

 between Great Britain and France, the previous Treaty of the 10th 

 February, 1763, between Great Britain and France, and the Treaty 

 of Utrecht of the llth April, 1713, in like manner contained a gen- 

 eral grant to " the subjects of France " to take fish on the Treaty 

 coast. During all that period no suggestion, so far as I can learn, 

 was ever made that Great Britain had a right to inquire into the 

 nationality of the members of the crew employed upon a French 

 vessel. 



Nearly two hundred years have passed during which the subjects 

 of the French King and the inhabitants of the United States have 

 exercised fishing rights under these grants made to them in these 

 general terms, and during all that time there has been an almost 

 continuous discussion in which Great Britain and her Colonies have 

 endeavoured to restrict the right to the narrowest possible limits, 

 without a suggestion that the crews of vessels enjoying the right, or 

 whose owners were enjoying the right, might not be emplo3*ed in the 

 customary way without regard to nationality. I cannot suppose 



that it is now intended to raise such a question. 



499 I observe with satisfaction that the Memorandum assents 

 to that part of my second proposition to the effect that " an 

 American vessel seeking to exercise the Treaty right is not bound to 

 obtain a licence from the Government of Newfoundland," and that 

 His Majesty's Government agree that " no law of Newfoundland 

 should be enforced on American fishermen which is inconsistent with 

 their rights under the Convention." 



The views of His Majesty's Government, however, as to what laws 

 of the Colony of Newfoundland would be inconsistent with the Con- 

 vention if applied to American fishermen, differ radically from the 

 view entertained by the Government of the United States. Accord- 

 ing to the Memorandum, the inhabitants of the United States going 

 in their vessels upon the Treaty coast to exercise the Treaty right of 

 fishing are bound to enter and clear in the Newfoundland custom- 

 houses, to pay light dues, even the dues from which coasting and 

 fishing-vessels owned and registered in the Colony are exempt, to 

 refrain altogether from fishing except at the time and in the man- 

 ner prescribed by the Regulations of Newfoundland. The Colonial 

 prohibition of fishing on Sundays is mentioned by the Memorandum 

 as one of the Regulations binding upon the American fishermen. We 

 are told that His Majesty's Government " hold that the only ground 

 on which the application of any provisions of t Colonial law to Amer- 

 ican vessels engaged in the fishery can be objected to is that it un- 

 reasonably interferes with the American right of fishery." 



The Government of the United States fails to find in the Treaty 

 any grant of right to the makers of Colonial law to interfere at all, 

 whether reasonably or unreasonably, with the exercise of the Ameri- 

 can rights of fishery, or any right to determine what would be a 

 reasonable interference with the exercise of that American right if 

 there could be any interference. The argument upon which the 

 Memorandum claims that the Colonial Government is entitled to in- 

 terfere with and limit the exercise of the American right of fishery,. 



