282 MISCELLANEOUS 



state of things that prevailed under the treaty of 1818, and I pro- 

 pose just to look cursorily at one or two of the more important pro- 

 visions of the treaty, more especially those that have been claimed 

 to be a surrender of the rights of this country, or Great Britain 

 as representing this country, with regard to the fisheries. The first 

 and the one about which most has been said, is the delimitation of 

 the bays, creeks and harbors, and it has been contended that by 

 fixing the ten miles limit to the width of a harbor, as indicating the 

 point from which the three mile measurement should be made, we 

 give up largely our rights over the waters of our coasts. Now I 

 maintain that that is not so, and I think it may easily be shown 

 not only that we have given up nothing that we have ever insisted 

 that we were entitled to, but that we have got a difficulty settled, 

 which might have been decided very much to our disadvantage. 

 What is the limit of the width of a bay or harbor which is not 

 to be a common bay or harbor under international law? Now I 

 defy any gentleman to point out to me any positive determination 

 of that question. Writers on international law speak of it in various 

 terms. Some of them say that it must not be a very large bay; 

 others give various other approximate descriptions of what should 

 constitute a bay belonging to a nation. 



Hon. Mr. DICKEY. Chesapeake Bay, for instance. 



Hon. Mr. ABBOTT. My hpn. friend is now speaking of a bay which 

 our neighbors have determined to keep to themselves, and to exer- 

 cise exclusive powers over. Whether they are right in theory, as a 

 matter of international law, is another question. Another writer 

 describes national water as the extent over which a nation is able to 

 maintain control. He does not define it. It is generally conceded to 

 be as far as a cannon shot can go from the shore, which has been con- 

 ventionally recognised as three miles. But the Eussians have lately 

 been contending that as a cannon shot can now be projected more 

 than three miles from the shore, the limit should be correspondingly 

 extended. So those persons who follow Mr. Vatel and others, who 

 have assumed three miles as a convenient limit for the rights of 

 nations, may find that limit too narrow. However, the limit broadly 

 stated by Vatel is that the right of a nation over the sea adjoining 

 its coast really extends just as far as it is able to maintain control. 

 That principle, it is true, civilized nations nowadays do not hold as 

 a rule: although the United States have broached very extensive 

 theories about their rights over the sea. They have gone so far as to 

 contend that war vessels cannot cruise within so many miles of their 

 coasts, and I think have complained of war ships coming within 

 twenty miles of them. They have laid down the doctrine in its broad- 

 est form with regard to their bays, the Chesapeake being one of them. 

 They claim the entire jurisdiction over them all, whatever may bo 

 their width, but that has not been, and is not now, the rule usually 

 followed by maritime nations. A great many of the important and 

 leading nations of the world have agreed among themselves as to 

 what is to be the size of a bay which shall not be a common bay 

 which shall be the territorial property and under the jurisdiction of 

 the nation within whose territory it practically extends. We our- 

 selves before the treaty of 1854 spoke of the ten mile limit as being a 

 reasonable limit. We proposed after the treaty of 1854 I am not 



