39 QUESTIONS THREE AND FOUR. 



CUSTOMS ENTRIES, AND LIGHT AND HARBOUR DUES. 



The British Case outlines the course of British and colonial legis- 

 lation regarding customs entries and light dues before and during 

 the periods covered by the treaties of 1T83 and 1818. It was there 

 contended that such legislation was reasonably incidental to laws 

 admitting vessels into a nation's coast waters, that it did not partake 

 of the nature of exclusion, and that it was not in any sense incon- 

 sistent with the treaty. 



LIGHT DUES. 



The United States Case contains no statement of the grounds upon 

 which the contention is made that it is inconsistent with the treaty 

 to exact payment of light dues, except such as may be gathered from 

 the diplomatic correspondence which commenced in 1905, extracts 

 from which are quoted in the Case. That correspondence having 

 been fully considered in the British Case, it will not be again dis- 

 cussed in this Counter-Case. While the United States at that time 

 denied the British right, these dues were still paid under the modus 

 vivendi then entered into, so that the practice theretofore existing 

 was not altered. 



CUSTOMS ON NON -TREATY COASTS. 



With reference to customs entries and harbour dues on non-treaty 

 coasts, the United States Case, after referring to certain diplomatic 

 correspondence that followed upon several seizures or threatened 

 seizures in 1886 and 1887, proceeds as follows (United States Case, 

 p. 197) :- 



It appears, therefore, that no objection was raised by the United 

 States to the imposition of harbor dues or the requirement of customs 

 entry in the case of American vessels permitted to enjoy commercial 

 privileges on these coasts, and that the objection on the part of the 

 United States was directed particularly to the imposition of such 

 conditions and exactions upon American fishing vessels exercising 

 their treaty right of entering the bays and harbors on these coasts 

 for the purposes specified in the treaty, when at the same time such 

 vessels were not permitted to enjoy commercial privileges. 



33 



