2042 NORTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



of regulations for the exercise by the French fishermen of their 

 privileges upon the coast of Newfoundland, without producing most 

 serious friction with France." 



That I believe to have been a just statement of the condition which 

 existed from very early times, practically from the time of the 

 Treaty of Utrecht of 1713, down to the making of the treaty of ] 004 

 which so radically changed the relations between Great Britain and 

 France upon that shore. 



But, the fact that Great Britain found in her relations with France 

 a reason for not framing regulations, whatever it may have been, 

 whatever may have been the secret spring of policy which moved the 

 Government of Great Britain, still leaves the fact standing, that in 

 1818, when these negotiators were re-granting to the United Statrs 

 the right that its inhabitants should have the liberty to take fish upon 

 that coast, they had before them the example of a grant by Great 

 Britain to France in those very words of a " liberty " to take fish 

 upon those shores, and for 105 years that " liberty " had been exer- 

 cised by France without possibility of regulation by Great Britain. 

 And, if the negotiators intended that the right that they were grant- 

 ing to the United States should be different in respect of regulation 

 from the right which had been granted to France, they should have 

 said so then and there, and they would have said so then and there, 

 in the treaty in which they made the grant. 



I now pass, Mr. President, to the practice under the treaty of 1783 

 between Great Britain and the United States. 



A schedule has been presented by the Attorney-General containing 

 a reference to a great number of statutes upon which it is asserted on 

 behalf of Great Britain that the rights of the United States to fish 

 upon the treaty coast under the treaty of 1783 were subjected to 

 regulation by Great Britain. That proposition I controvert, and I 

 affirm upon the record that is here that the exercise of fishing right 

 by the inhabitants of the United States upon the treaty coast under 

 the treaty of 1783 never was subjected to regulation by Great Britain. 

 These statutes in the British Memorandum are arranged in 

 1236 order of date, without special reference to the countries, or 

 without any complete separation in respect of the countries or 

 colonies in which the statutes were enacted. 



Let me first refer to the statutes which are said to have been passed 

 in certain of the colonies now forming part of the United States, 

 and which did in 1818 form part of the United States. 



I do not consider that those statutes are relevant to the question 

 whether American rights on the treaty coast were regulated under 

 the treaty of 1783. Manifestly they are not. Their materiality is. 

 I suppose, considered to be that their existence would naturally have 



