ARGUMENT OF SIE WILLIAM EOBSON. 1867 



SIR W. ROBSON : I do not think that is quite their meaning. They 

 say there is one doubtful element in maritime jurisdiction, that is the 

 distance of territorial water from the shore, we must agree upon that, 

 whatever we agree about territorial jurisdiction must be common to 

 us both. Bays are not mentioned, but what is meant is, whatever 

 you claim for maritime jurisdiction we are to have. You have got 

 your bays, we are to have ours, and we have got ours, we are not going 

 to let you into them. 



SIR CHARLES FITZPATRICK : But landing and drying on a shore has 

 nothing to do with maritime jurisdiction: it is territorial is it not? 



SIR W. ROBSON : It was rather territorial, or land jurisdiction, but 

 I think that is the meaning of the clause, taking it as a whole. Bays 

 are not mentioned, and it is stipulated that each party shall have that, 

 in effect, impliedly, because each party had to have the same juris- 

 diction over the water as the other had. Then having got that juris- 

 diction, Great Britain goes on to say, as she does in the next letter, 

 we are not going to let you into our bays because you trouble us so 

 much there with your landing rights, we are going to keep you out. 



Then we come to the next letter which makes it a little plainer, that 

 is the letter of the 18th October. 



Of course, nobody then thought of giving up the bays at all. There 

 would not be much reciprocity, if all this meant they were to keep 

 Delaware Bay, and we were to give up Chaleur. 



Then, we come to the protocol of the Conference at Ghent on the 

 1st December, 1814 (British Counter-Case Appendix, p. 141) : 



" The American plenipotentiaries also proposed the following 

 amendment to Article 8th, viz. : ' The inhabitants of the United States 

 shall continue to enjoy the liberty to take, dry and cure fish in places 

 within the exclusive jurisdiction of Great Britain, as secured by the 

 former treaty of peace ; ' : 



Now, when we turn to the former treaty of peace, what was the 

 exclusive jurisdiction of Great Britain ? It was the " liberty " the 

 sphere within which liberty to fish operated, " bays, creeks, and har- 

 bours." That was the exclusive jurisdiction under that treaty. 

 There is no other mentioned. 



The same thing appears on p. 149. They all go back to the treaty 

 of 1783. That is the keynote of all of my argument at present. 

 There is a report of the American Plenipotentiaries to the United 

 States Secretary of State on p. 149, and the passage to which I 

 desire to refer is on p. 150 where it begins : 



" In consenting, by that treaty, that a part of the North American 

 continent should remain subject to the British jurisdiction, the people 

 of the United States had reserved to themselves the liberty, which 

 they had ever before enjoyed, of fishing upon that part of its coasts, 

 and of drying and curing fish upon the shores, and this reservation 

 had been agreed to by the other contracting party." 



