AEGUMENT OF SIB WILLIAM EOBSON. 1651 



contested the authority and right of Great Britain to exercise juris- 

 diction over the American fishermen who were said then to have 

 broken the regulation by fishing on Sunday. 



The correspondence in relation to these two separate matters coin- 

 cided, and I think may easily cause a little confusion, unless one is 

 careful to distinguish the letters and telegrams relating to one matter 



from those relating to the other. 



998 I think Mr. Turner has not quite kept those matters apart 



in his mind when dealing with this point, because his sugges- 

 tion was that the money was not paid under the Halifax Award 

 unless and until Great Britain gave an assurance on this very matter 

 of jurisdiction, which Mr. Turner suggests it did, and thereby aban- 

 doned for that time at all events its claim as put forward now. 



I think this is a misapprehension. The real reason why there was 

 any difficulty or dispute about the payment of the money under the 

 Halifax Award had nothing to do with the question of jurisdiction 

 or the dispute that arose in Fortune Bay. It had to do with a totally 

 different point, which was strictly material to the award, namely, 

 whether or not the Arbitrators on that occasion had exceeded their 

 jurisdiction. 



There were various other matters which arose, quite unnecessary 

 for me to go into, where I have so much to deal with, but there was 

 a delay in paying the amount due under the award, and there was 

 on the part of the United States an objection to paying that amount, 

 but it was simply and solely in relation to those points that were 

 connected with the award, namely, have the Arbitrators dealt here 

 with something beyond their powers, and ought they or ought they 

 not, under the terms of the award to be unanimous? Those are the 

 two questions, and I think, inadverently, Mr. Turner has not kept 

 them quite apart. 



Mr. Turner, at p. 2988 [p. 494 supra] of his speech, reads a letter 

 from Mr. Evarts inviting the attention of Lord Salisbury to this 

 question of jurisdiction. That letter was written, as indeed the dis- 

 turbance happened in Fortune Bay, at a time when there was also 

 this difficulty about the jurisdiction of the Arbitrators. He gives 

 the date of the letter and proceeds to read it. He says Mr. Evarts 

 makes this remark: 



" In the opinion of this government, it is essential that we should 

 at once invite the attention of Lord Salisbury to the question of pro- 

 vincial control over the fishermen of the United States in their prose- 

 cution of the privilege secured to them by the treaty. So grave a 

 question in its bearing upon the obligations of this government under 

 the treaty, makes it necessary that the President should ask from 

 Her Majesty's Government a frank avowal or disavowal of the para- 

 mount authority of Provincial legislation to regulate the enjoyment 

 by our people of the inshore fishery, which seems to be intimated, if 

 not asserted, in Lord Salisbury's note. 



