1520 KOBTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



argument. It is a report of Mr. Evarts, as Secretary of State, to 

 the President, on the occurrence at Fortune Bay, and it bears date the 

 17th May, 1880. I refer the Tribunal to p. 284 of the British Case 

 Appendix. Mr. Evarts says : 



" This being the subject of the grant and this the title and posses- 

 sion of the grantor, what is the Treaty description of the estate, 

 right, and privilege granted to the United States for the enjoyment 

 of its citizens? The text of the Fishery Articles of the Treaty of 

 Washington shows that there was no limitation whatever upon the 

 grant, except that the estate, right, and privilege granted were to 

 endure but for a term of years, and were to be enjoyed by the United 

 States, not exclusively, but in common with Great Britain. There 

 was, to be sure, a restriction imposed upon both countries which 

 excluded both equally from extending the enjoyment of cither's share 

 of the common fishery beyond the ' inhabitants of the United States ' 

 on the one side, and 'Her Britannic Majesty's subjects' on the other, 

 thus disabling either Government from impairing the share of the 

 other by introducing foreign fishermen into the common fishery. 

 But this feature in the grant has no significance in the measure of 

 the concession as now disputed by Great Britain and contended for 

 by the United States." 



The argument drawn by Great Britain is that Mr. Evarts was 

 dealing with the composition of fishing crews, and that he expressly 

 indicates that no one can be introduced into the fishery, even as an 

 employee or servant, unless he is an inhabitant of the United States. 

 It requires only the reading of the entire report and a brief consider- 

 ation of the entire situation to show that Mr. Evarts was dealing 

 with nothing of the sort. No question had been raised of the right of 

 inhabitants of the United States to employ foreigners on their ves- 

 sels, Newfoundlanders among the rest. He had no such subject under 

 consideration. It had not been mentioned. What he was dealing 

 with was what the grantee could do, or what the United States, as 

 the United States, could do, and he expressly pointed out that neither 

 the United States nor Great Britain could grant any portion of the 

 right to a foreign power. The whole paragraph that precedes the 

 one which I have just read indicates that. Mr. Evarts says: 



" That the British proprietorship in, and dominion over, this in- 

 shore fishery was perfect, absolute, and without incumbrance or lim- 

 itations, and that this was the subject concerning which the negotia- 

 tions were occupied, and by and to which the Treaty equivalents were 

 to be measured and applied, was certainly never doubted by the nego- 

 tiators of this Treaty on the part of the United States or of Great 

 Britain. Whatever this fishery was in its natural extent and value, 

 in its geographical area and its multitude and variety of fish-prod- 

 ucts, that was the subject of which Great Britain possessed the jus 

 disponendi and that the subject of which the United States proposed 

 to acquire an undivided share," 



