BRITISH, COLONIAL AND OTHER CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 499 



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

 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 inhabitants of 

 both countries used at any time heretofore to fish, and also that the 

 inhabitants of the United States shall have the 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, harbours, and creeks on all other of His 

 Britannic Majesty's dominions in America." (See article 3.) From 

 1783 until the war of 1812, between the two countries, citizens of the 

 United States continued to enjoy the rights secured to them by the 

 article which I have quoted. At the close of the war of 1812-15 the 

 British Government took the position that in consequence of the war 

 the fishery privileges granted to citizens of the United States, by 

 article 3 of the Treaty of 1783, had become abrogated and that the 

 citizens of the United States had therefore no longer the right to fish 

 in any of the British North American waters. This led to the con- 

 clusion of the Treaty of the 20th of October 1818, article i of which 

 defines the present fishing privileges of the citizens of the United 

 States in the waters of this colony. The intent and meaning of that 

 article may be gathered from the instruction which issue to the Amer- 

 ican negotiators of it. 



On the 20th of July, 1818, Mr. Adams, Secretary of State for the 

 United States, instructed Mr. Kush and Mr. Gallatin, the American 

 negotiators, as follows: 



" The President authorises you to agree to an article whereby the 

 United States will desist from the liberty of fishing, and curing, and 

 drying fish within the British jurisdiction generally, upon the condi- 

 tion that it shall be secured as a permanent right, not liable to be 

 impaired by any future war, from Cape Eay to Rameau Islands and 

 from Mount Joly on the Labrador coast, through the Straits of Belle 

 Isle, and indefinitely north along the coast ; the right to extend as well 

 to curing and drying the fish as to fishing." 



This instruction, I submit, clearly sets forth the demand of the 

 United States, and leaves no room whatever for doubt but that the 

 Treaty of 1818 was intended to conform to it and to the principles 

 involved in it. If this is admitted, then the construction that I have 

 placed upon article i of the treaty is the correct one. 



I have seen an attempt made to argue that the terms of the Wash- 

 ington Treaty and the Treaty of 1818 were identical, and that the 

 contentions and admissions of the British counsel acting on the Hali- 

 fax Commission of 1877 must have an important bearing on the con- 

 struction of the Treaty of 1818. I can not conceive how any such 

 view can be seriously put forward. The Treaty of Washington was 

 negotiated and entered into in order to secure to the contracting par- 

 ties privileges in excess of those enjoyed by virtue of the Treaty of 

 1818. The Halifax Commission was an international arbitration 

 convened to decide whether the United States had received a greater 

 benefit under the Washington Treaty than had Great Britain. The 

 British had claimed a large money consideration for privileges which 

 they alleged the United States had enjoyed under the Washington 

 Treaty in excess of what the British had. All kinds of loose argu- 

 ments could be and were used by counsel on both sides, but surely it 

 will not be seriously contended that the arguments of counsel before 

 92909 S. Doc. 870, 61-3, vol 6 40 



