NOKTil ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



Mr. Adams reported this correspondence to Washington, and there- 

 upon Mr. Monroe, who was then Secretary of State, replied acknowl- 

 edging the receipt of the correspondence, in a letter dated the 27th 

 February, 1816, which appears on p. 287 of the United States Ca-r 

 Appendix. Mr. Munroe says: 



" It appeals by these communications that, although the British 

 (Jovernment denies our right of taking, curing and drying fish within 

 iheir jurisdiction, and on the coast of the British provinces in North 

 America, it is willing to secure to our citizens the liberty stipulated 

 by the treaty of 1783, under such regulations as will secure the benefit 

 to both parties, and will likewise prevent the smuggling of goods into 

 the British provinces by our vessels engaged in the fisheries." 



Then he goes on to say that he encloses a power authorising Mr. 

 Adams to negotiate a convention providing for the objects con 

 templated. 



And on p. 288 of the United States Case Appendix, the very next 

 page, the Tribunal will find a power from Mr. Munroe to Mr. Adams, 

 dated the 27th February, 1816. the same day as the letter which I 

 have just read : 



" Sir: It being represented, by your letter of the 8th of November, 

 that the British Government was disposed to regulate, in concert 

 with the United States, the taking of fish on the coasts, bays, and 

 creeks of all His Britannic Majesty's dominions in America, and tin- 

 curing and drying of fish by their citizens on the unsettled bay-. 

 harbors, and creeks of Nova Scotia, Magdalen islands, and Labrador. 

 in such manner as to promote the interest of l>!>th milieu-, yen will 

 consider this letter an authority and instruction to negotiate a con- 

 vention for these purposes." 



The negotiation went on with a long period of offer and refusal 

 and new offers, and give-and-take bargaining regarding the extent 

 of territory, until finally it brought up with these negotiators at 

 London making the treaty of 1818, and with these letters in their 

 hands both parties: and there the British negotiators propo-e.l 

 express joint regulations. In the articles presented by the British 

 negotiators at the fifth conference, appearing at p. 312 of the 

 United States Case Appendix, the Tribunal will see that they 

 1248 proposed express joint regulations to govern the protection of 

 rivers the very subject on which this power of local regula- 

 tions had been given to the local magistrates, and to which this New 

 Brunswick statute about the River St. John referred, and to which 

 the revised statutes of New Brunswick referred. They do not depend 

 upon any power of Great Britain, or of any British colony to pa>< 

 laws which shall carry river protection into the bays or harbors to 

 which the Americans may come. They do not rely upon any power 

 of any British legislative body to draw the line between the river and 

 the bay, to draw the line where they may go with their protection of 



