AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 1547 



be assumed that these controverted claims are by you deemed to be a 

 just ground of award. We never can know the contrary, unless you say 

 so ; and, if you are to say so, we think that convenience and justice both 

 require that yon should say so at such an early day as to enable us to 

 shape the conduct of our case iu conformity with your decision. 



Mr. THOMSON. 1 would like to know whether anything more is to be 

 said on the subject by our learned friends opposite. 



Mr. FOSTER. We understand that, as is the case in connection with 

 every other motion, the party moving has the right, in this instance, to 

 open and close the argument. 



Mr. THOMSON. I make this observation simply because, in the course 

 of the American Agent's remarks, he said that Mr. Trescot had given 

 particular attention to the treaties, and hence I assumed that he was 

 about to be followed by Mr. Trescot. It would be obviously unjust to 

 the counsel acting on behalf of Her Majesty's Government if they should 

 iiow be called upon to answer the argument that has been made with- 

 out hearing all that is really to be said on the other side. I understand 

 that the other side have an undoubted right to reply to anything which 

 we may say, but if Mr. Trescot is afterwards to start a new argument, 

 as I rather infer from Mr. Foster's remarks he will do, this might put 

 another phase on the matter. 



Mr. TRESCOT. As I understand the position taken by Mr. Foster, it 

 is very plain, and stated with all the fullness and precision necessary. 

 He takes the ground that the commercial relations between Great Brit- 

 ain and the United States stand either on ordinary international comity 

 or upon treaty regulations. If upon the latter, then they rest upon the 

 Treaty of 1794, the third permanent article of which did determine the 

 commercial relations which were to exist between the United States and 

 the British North American Colonies; because iu 1815 the Commercial 

 Convention, then adopted and extended iu 1815 and 1827, renewed that 

 article, even if it should be contended, as I think it never has been 

 before by the British Government, that the permanent articles of the 

 Treaty of 1794 were abrogated by the war of 1812. The negotiators of 

 the Convention of 1815 took the third article of the Treaty of 1794 as a 

 basis, but not being able to agree as to certain modifications, decided to 

 omit the article and to declare that "the intercourse between the United 

 States and His Britannic Majesty's possessions in the West Indies and 

 on the Continent of North America shall not be affected by any of the 

 provisions of this article, i. e., the article of the Convention of 1815 in 

 reference to the commercial relations between the United States and 

 the possessions of His Britannic Majesty in Europe, but each party shall 

 remain in the complete possession of its right with respect to such inter- 

 course? those rights being, as we contend, the old rights established 

 by the Treaty of 1815. But the question has not a very important bear- 

 ing upon our present contention, and has been suggested simply in reply 

 to what we understand is to be one of the positions on the other side, 

 viz, that if we deny that commercial privileges were granted by the 

 Treaty of 1871, and are not, therefore, proper subjects of compensation, 

 in this award, then we have no right whatever to these- commercial 

 privileges; and I can say in reply to the very proper inquiry of my 

 friend Mr. Thomson, that iu any remarks I may make, that is the 

 extent of the position which will be taken, but I do not expect to refer 

 to the point at all. 



Mr. THOMSON. In reference to the time at which this motion should 

 be heard, in view of the arguments which the learned Agent of the 

 United States has used, I shall not, ou behalf of Her Majesty's Govern- 



