1056 NORTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHEEIES ARBITRATION. 



The Secretary of State added this clause to the instructions, which 

 is not set out in the Case of Great Britain, but which is found in the 

 Appendix to the British Case on p. 60 : 



" If the distance of four leagues cannot be obtained, any distance 

 not less than one sea league may be substituted in the article. It will 

 occur to you that the stipulation against the roving and hovering of 

 armed ships on our coasts so as to endanger or alarm trading vessels, 

 will acquire importance as the space entitled to immunity shall be 

 narrowed." 



Lord Holland and Lord Auckland, who were, as I have stated, the 

 Commissioners on behalf of Great Britain, antedating the signing of 

 any treaty, requested an instruction from Lord Howick, the Minister 

 of Foreign Affairs for Great Britain, to which I wish to call the at- 

 tention of the Tribunal, and which was not even referred to in con- 

 nection with the discussion of the treaty of 1806 by the counsel for 

 Great Britain. 



This note has a most important bearing on these negotiations. It 

 was addressed to Lord Howick, under date of 14th November, 1806, 

 and appears on p. 61 of the Appendix to the British Case : 



" In elucidation of the subject of our public despatch we beg leave 

 to lay before you the following observations on the nature of the ex- 

 tension of jurisdiction suggested by the American Commissioners, on 

 the real value of such a concession compared with that which they 

 seem to set upon it as well as the reasons which in our opinion induce 

 them to urge it so strenuously. 



" The distance of a cannon shot from shore is as far as we have 

 been able to ascertain the general limit of maritime jurisdiction and 

 that distance is for the sake of convenience practically construed into 

 three miles or a league." 



Now, if the Tribunal please, I have read the decisions of Lord 

 Stowell, delivered in 1800, in 1801, and in 1805, in the High Court of 

 Admiralty of England, in which that great jurist identified the can- 

 not-shot rule with the 3-marine-mile rule; and I have read the deci- 

 sion of Mr. Justice Story, of the Supreme Court of the United States, 

 delivered in 1812, affecting a seizure made in 1808, in which he stated 

 that the 3-mile rule was the rule of international law. 



These Commissioners went on to state to their Government, read- 

 ing from p. 61 of the Appendix to the British Case : 



"All independent nations possess such jurisdiction on their coasts 

 and the right to it is not only generally contained in the acknowledg- 

 ment of the independence of the United States, but seems to have 

 been specifically alluded to in the 25th article or the treaty of 1794. 

 Particular circumstances resulting from immemorial usage, geo- 

 graphical position or stipulations of treaty have sometimes led to an 

 extension of jurisdiction, and may therefore when applicable, be 

 urged as a justification of such a pretension." 



