ARGUMENT OF CHARLES B. WARREN. 1057 



They refer, if the Tribunal please, to the attitude of the United 

 States as a " pretension " ; that is, their desire for some protection 

 over the bodies of water enclosed within the headlands. 



The note continues : 



" The natural causes which should lead to such exceptions are vari- 

 ously stated by authors and those urged by the American commis- 

 sioners as applicable to their country are to be found occasionally 

 among them. Thus, the remoteness of a country from the 

 636 jurisdiction of all others is acknowledged as diminishing the 

 inconvenience of an extension of her own. The practice of 

 some nations even at this day though not of great authority is 

 founded on such a claim, and even the admitted jurisdiction over an 

 inland sea seems to rest on reasoning nearly similar. Selden, who 

 had however a strong bias in favour of extended jurisdictions argues 

 from such a principle in favour of the maritime pretensions of Eng- 

 land, and the claim of a division of the sovereignty of a sea lying 

 between two Powers such as Great Britain and Spain has been as- 

 serted and is still seriously maintained in our law books of authority. 



" The space between headlands is more generally laid down, and 

 admitted by Grotius himself, as subject to the exclusive jurisdiction 

 of the power to whom the land belongs. But neither in theory nor 

 in practice do we find the distance between the headlands to which 

 such a rule must exclusively apply accurately defined. James 1st 

 by his royal proclamation dated 1st of March 1604, prohibiting hos- 

 tilities between belligerent nations within his jurisdiction, stated 

 headlands more than 90 miles distant one from another as forming 

 bays necessarily dependent on and belonging to the adjoining terri- 

 tory but it is remarkable that the Spaniards who were one of the 

 objects of this prohibition, considered the order as a relaxation not 

 as an extension of his lawful jurisdiction over the seas. 



" The circumstances however on which the American commission- 

 ers have chiefly relied is the shelving nature of their coast; and 

 though from the east end of Long Island northwards it does not 

 deserve such a description they allege that it is so broken with rocks 

 as to oblige coasting vessels to keep at a considerable distance from 

 the land. A shelving coast is urged as a reason for an extension of 

 jurisdiction on the principle that a right over the neighbouring parts 

 of the sea is not solely founded on power but on convenience for the 

 protection of trade from the molestation of belligerent vessels; and 

 an inference may be thence drawn in favour of an extension of juris- 

 diction on a coast where the usual limits admit of little or no navi- 

 gation. 



"Though such protection afforded to their coasters give them a 

 local exemption from our right of impressment, it would diminish it 

 is said, the odium attached to that practice among them in much 

 greater degree than it would abridge the advantages resulting from 

 it to us. For, one instance of vexation within sight of the shore 

 excites more discontent than many of a similar nature which do not 

 reach the country till the passions of the parties have in a great 

 measure subsided. 



" Though claims of an extension of jurisdiction beyond the cannon 

 shot of the three miles have been asserted and maintained in particular 



