1544 NORTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



be covered by a portion of the formal submission which I have 

 made : 



" That it is respectfully submitted that the limit to which the Tri- 

 bunal can go, in regard to questions that might arise based upon mat- 

 ters other than mere inhabitancy or non-inhabitancy is, in deciding 

 Question No. 2, to state that their award does not cover such other 

 questions." 



I am pleased to say that I have finished Question No. 2, and will 

 ask the attention of the Tribunal to Questions Nos. 3 and 4. 



The form of the questions is so familiar to the Court that I shall 

 not take the time to read them, and, for the purposes of my discus- 

 sion, these two questions can be dealt with together. I have recently 

 read Senator Turner's argument with reference to those questions, 

 and am convinced that I ought not to interrupt by my competition 

 the thread and strength of his presentation of those questions. 



I only desire to call attention to two matters with which he did not 

 deal. The first is the appearance of the word " condition " in one 

 of the questions, and the word " conditional " in the other of those 

 questions. I am not going to call to the attention of the Tribunal 

 the definition of those words in our law, because it seems to me that 

 there is a practical side to it which goes beyond even the strict inter- 

 pretation of the words themselves. 



Sir Robert Finlay was disposed, in answer to the questions of the 

 President of the Tribunal, to regard the words as meaning terms 

 upon which the liberties, in one case and the privilege in the other 

 might be exercised. I do not think that that is the meaning of the 

 word " condition " or " conditional." With the mere question of the 

 definition of a word in this submission I do not care to deal ; but I 

 wish to ask the attention of the Tribunal to the practical working of 

 the thing, either upon the treaty coast or upon the non-treaty coast. 



How would it work in actual practice ? A vessel does not enter or 

 call at the customs, does not pay harbour or light dues, and if she is 

 not prosecuted while she is there, for non-entry, as may possibly 

 occur, she will do as fishing- vessels always do return. It is a part 

 of their trade to go back to the same fishing-grounds and to the same 

 place. She is then exposed to attachment or seizure, or her captain 

 is exposed to prosecution. And it does not make any difference 

 whether I am dealing with the non-treaty coast or the treaty coast. 

 The right of going in for shelter or repairs or wood or water on the 

 non-treaty coast, of course, extends to the entire stretch of coast. The 

 vessel may never be driven in by stress of weather to the same port 

 again, but the Canadian ports, which comprise most of the non-treaty 

 coast, are all under the same Government now, and this record dis- 

 closes that they have a very complete system of keeping track of 

 vessels that are supposed to have broken regulations, or failed to 

 make payment at any port, whereby the vessel is seized at some other 



