2016 NOBTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



superior and the other inferior. The grant, to the extent of the 

 terras of the grant, is superior because it limits the sovereignty, and 

 when you have gone to the grant and found how far the terms of 

 the grant go and the extent to which sovereignty is excluded, to that 

 extent there can be no implied reservation of sovereignty whatever. 



THE PRESIDENT: If it can be said on one side that there can be no 

 implied reservation of sovereignty, can it not be said on the other 

 side that there can be no implied abdication of sovereignty '( The 

 consequence would be that one must stick to the words of the treaty, 

 and consider that it confers only that right which is expressed by 

 ipsissimis verbis of the treaty. 



SENATOR ROOT : That is undoubtedly true. The words of the treaty 

 must be construed according to what is found to be their true mean- 

 ing, and giving effect to all the words which are of consequence or of 

 importance in the treaty. Of course, you have to find there an ex- 

 clusion of sovereignty in the grant reasonably construed. The terms 

 of the grant are general and without any limit except the limit of 

 territory, and the limit carried by the fact that the rights are in com- 

 mon. The grant carries the right, to be held in common with British 

 subjects, to take fish of every kind within this territory, and there is 

 in it no power on the part of any one to say that the right shall not 

 be exercised except where I choose that it shall be exercised, when I 

 choose that it shall be exercised, or in the way that I choose it shall 

 be exercised. That is the grant, and to that extent it excludes, pushes 

 back the power of British sovereignty. Within that extent there can 

 be no implied reservation. It rests with whoever claims to find in the 

 terms of the grant authority on the part of the grantor to say to the 

 grantee: You shall not do this except when I say, or as I say, or 

 where I say, to show reason for it, to show ground for it. 



Now, I will ask you to consider some of the grounds of such a 

 claim which are presented. One of them, and one which has been 

 pressed somewhat, is that there is an implication from the fact that 

 the liberty is a liberty in common with British subjects. It is claimed 

 by Great Britain that from that fact results a right of Great Britain 

 to say that the citizens of the United States are to be subject to the 

 same legislative control as the citizens of Great Britain. We nm>t 

 discriminate a little now. The personal conduct, of course, of the 

 Americans who go upon the treaty coast is subject to the same control, 

 but that is the result, not of the fact that the right which they <ro 

 there to exercise is a right in common, but of the fact that they are in 

 British territory; and the great field of control by Great Britain 

 results not from the common quality of the right which they go there 

 to exercise, but from the fact that they are there within British juris 

 diction. In the next place, it should be observed, that it is the riyht 



