ARGUMENT OP ELlHtJ ROOT. 2113 



" SIR WILLIAM ROBSON : Yes. Of course every contract is a lim- 

 itation, as I have so frequently said." 



He says further: 



" They " 



The United States. 



" want something more than mere restriction of sovereignty. They 

 want to have it established that when a United States inhabitant 

 comes in, not merely is the sovereign right of Great Britain re- 

 stricted to the extent that it cannot put him out, but they say it 

 cannot govern him when he is there in the exercise of his right." 



So, we are all agreed and it is to be taken as a law of this case that 

 this contract, whether it be a real right, in our view, or whether it 

 be obligatory, in the view of Great Britain, does restrict the sov- 

 ereignty of Great Britain. 



Now, there is a restriction of sovereignty, and from that restric- 

 tion follows a binding obligation which limits the power of Great 

 Britain to deal with the right which she has contracted away. 



There is a second difference this one as to result. If this be a 

 real right, as we think it is, the United States would have a 

 1278 right of control over the conduct of its citizens in the exer- 

 cise of the real right in this territory, and laws made to 

 govern the time and manner in which they exercise that right would 

 be laws which, for their validity, required the assent of the United 

 States. They would be invalid, as affecting its citizens, but for the 

 assent of the United States. The law-making power of Great 

 Britain would not be " competent," to use Lord Salisbury's lan- 

 guage, to make what would be a law binding upon the citizens of the 

 United States without the assent of the United States, as an element 

 in the law making. 



On the other hand, if the treaty creates an obligatory limit upon 

 Great Britain, if the limitation of her sovereignty is a limitation 

 created by perpetual obligation, and if the exercise of the sovereign 

 power of Great Britain in that territory makes a law, which over- 

 steps the limit of her obligation, which she was bound in the con- 

 tract not to make, that is a wrongful exercise of her sovereignty, from 

 which this Tribunal is bound, if it can see it, to restrain her, because 

 this Tribunal is to enforce the obligation wherever the obligation is. 

 I hope I make the distinction clear. 



THE PRESIDENT : Very clear. 



SENATOR ROOT : The practical result would be that if you say this 

 is an obligation which prevents Great Britain from rightfully mak- 

 ing certain laws, then, while Great Britain would have the sovereign 

 power to make the laws, she would be precluded by your Award from 

 making them, or putting them into force, until she had got the con- 

 currence of the United States in their being reasonable, fair, neces- 



