60 COUNTER CASE OF THE UNITED STATES. 



States will agree to them, but it cannot submit to have them im- 

 posed upon it without its consent. This position is not a matter 

 of theory. It is of vital and present importance, for the plain object 

 of recent legislation of the Colony of Newfoundland has been prac- 

 tically to destrov the value of American rights under the Treaty 

 of 1818. 



So far as the contentions of the United States on these issues de- 

 pend upon questions of law or upon the construction of the language 

 of the treaty, or the value and effect of the evidence presented on 

 both sides, they will be discussed in the arguments to be addressed 

 to the Tribunal on behalf of the United States, and do not require 

 examination in the Counter-Case; neither is it necessary to review 

 here the evidence already presented in the Case of the United States 

 in support of its contentions. It is sufficient for the present to note 

 that, as appears from the foregoing examination of the evidence 

 presented in the British Case, such evidence fails to show that, at 

 the time this treaty was entered into, it was regarded on either side 

 as having the meaning now contended for by Great Britain with 

 reference to this Question, or that any such interpretation has since 

 then been established in its practical operation by the actions of the 

 two Governments or either of them. 



U. S. Case, p. 225. 



