440 MISCELLANEOUS 



meant not only from headland to headland, but the bays, coves, creeks, 

 and harbors which form the sinuosities of the coast. 



In reply to that observation I would say that the word " coast " in 

 the treaty has been defined by His Majesty's Government to mean the 

 very opposite to what the leader of the opposition has declared it to 

 mean. In the report of the Committee on Foreign Relations, to 

 which was referred in 1888 the message of the President of the United 

 States concerning the interpretation of the treaty of the 20th October, 

 1818, 1 find the following : " The British contention has been that the 

 word ' coasts ' in the treaty relates only to the open seacoasts, and not 

 to the coasts of bays, harbors, and creeks that are claimed and con- 

 trolled by the provincial governments as territorial waters." 



The " absurdity," then, of which I am accused by the leader of the 

 opposition is based upon the construction given to the word " coast " 

 in the treaty of 1818 by His Majesty's Government, who, of course, 

 would be advised in the premises by the law officers of the Crown. 

 My honorable friend, the leader of the opposition, will pardon me if 

 I prefer to accept the opinion of the ablest lawyers in England to his 

 on this matter. 



But it was quite apparent that the leader of the opposition was not 

 quite sure of his ground when he proceeded to define the meaning of 

 the word " coast in the treaty, for he subsequently dealt with what 

 he termed " right by custom." If, he said, " the position of the pre- 

 mier be correct, then custom and practice would entitle the American 

 fishermen to enter the creeks, coves, and harbors between Rameau 

 Islands and Cape Ray and between Cape Ray and Quirpon Islands 

 to fish." 



While I do not concur in that doctrine, let us briefly examine what 

 the custom has been, and as the leader of the opposition went back 

 to what he termed the ancient customs, those which Americans en- 

 joyed when British subjects and which were not renounced by the 

 treaty of 1818, we will examine the records. 



Before the war of independence in 1775, British- American colo- 

 nists enjoyed equal privileges in the North American inshore fisheries, 

 but after that war their privileges were curtailed, and the full extent 

 of their privileges is set forth in the third article of the Treaty of 

 Paris, of date 3d September, 1783, as follows : 



" It is agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to 

 enjoy unmolested the right to take fish of every kind on the Grand 

 Bank, and on all the other banks of Newfoundland ; also in the Gulf 

 of St. Lawrence, and at all other places in the sea, where the inhab- 

 itants of both countries used heretofore to fish; and also that the 

 inhabitants of the United States shall have liberty to take fish of 

 every kind on such part of the coast of Newfoundland as British 

 fishermen shall use (but not to dry or cure the same on that island), 

 and also on the coasts, bays, and creeks of all other of His Britannic 

 Majesty's dominions in America; and that the American fishermen 

 shall have liberty to dry and cure fish in any of the unsettled bays, 

 harbors, and creeks of Nova Scotia, Magdalen Islands, and Labrador 

 so long as the same shall remain unsettled ; but so soon as the same, 

 or either of them, shall be settled, it shall not be lawful for the said 

 fishermen to dry or cure fish at such settlement without a previous 

 agreement for that purpose with the inhabitants, proprietors, or pos- 

 sessors of the ground." 



