26 COUNTER CASE OF THE UNITED STATES. 



and the attitude taken by the British Government in that case 

 showed that the position of the United States on the subject of regu- 

 lations had been entirely misunderstood by Great Britain; and the 

 question of subjecting to regulation the American liberty of fishing 

 under these treaties was at once taken up for discussion. The diplo- 

 matic correspondence, which followed, has already been reviewed in 

 the Case of the United States, 6 and, although on the part of the 

 United States it dealt with the question of regulations generally, 

 whether adopted during the period covered by the treaty or in force 

 when the treaty was entered into, yet it will be found that the British 

 contention advanced at that time concerned only regulations in force 

 when the treaty of 1871 was made and related only to the American 

 fishing liberty on the treaty coasts covered by the treaties of 1854 and 

 1871, which were distinct from the treaty coasts under the treaty of 

 1818. No evidence has been, or can be, adduced of any attempt to 

 impose regulations adopted after the date of the treaty of 1818 upon 

 the exercise of the American fishing liberty on the treaty coasts under 

 that treaty while the treaty of 1871 was in force. The British conten- 

 tion was asserted in its present form for the first time in the contro- 

 versy which arose in 1906 out of the attempt of Newfoundland to 

 enforce the Foreign Fishing Vessels Act of 1905. 



The British contention. 



In view of the foregoing statements, a distinct issue of fact be- 

 tween the United States and Great Britain on some features of the 

 Question under consideration is disclosed by the following statement 

 in the British Case: 



In 1856, and on several occasions between 1866 and 1872, the atten- 

 tion of the United States Government was called to the necessity of 

 fishermen obeying Colonial laws, but no objection was taken. It was 

 not until 1878 that the present contention was first raised.* 



It is not intended in the Counter-Case to trespass upon the prov- 

 ince of the printed and oral arguments by entering into an argu- 

 mentative discussion of issues of fact ; but here the evidence relied on in 

 the British Case in support of the above-quoted statement is regarded 

 on the part of the United States as leading to a directly contrary 

 conclusion from that reached in the British Case, and as confirming, 



U. S. Case, p. 162. U. S. Case, pp. 209, 225. 



U. S. Case, pp. 162-176. d British Case, p. 24. 



