AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 1571 



permitted the United States to exercise independently of the treaty, 

 however nearly they may be connected with the fisheries, and however 

 important they may be to fishermen. It must be something which Great 

 Britain has ceded by the Treaty of 1871, or you have nothing to do with 

 it; whatever was done, at however great a loss to Great Britain, and 

 however great a benefit to the United States, you have but to compare 

 the two matters which have been ceded by each side in the Treaty of 

 1871, and find whether one is more valuable than another, and if so, 

 how much more valuable. Therefore we are brought to this question: 

 Does the Treaty of 1871 give to the United States the right to buy bait, 

 ice, provisions, supplies for vessels, and to transship cargoes within 

 British dominions f If the Treaty of Washington does give that to 

 us, then it is an element for you to consider in making up your pecu- 

 niary calculation. If the Treaty of Washington does not give that to 

 us, then I congratulate this high tribunal that it may put these matters 

 entirely out of mind, and save many days of examination and cross- 

 examination, and some perplexity of mind. Because your excellency 

 and your honors will remember that if you are to fix a value upon them, 

 that is, the value to the United States of the right to buy bait, ice, and 

 provisions, and to transship cargoes, that will not be all you will have 

 to do. You will have also to ascertain the value to the provinces of the 

 corresponding right which they would have in the United States; and 

 you will have still further difficulty, I think, to ascertain what benefit 

 this American commerce is to British subjects, and deduct that. 



The task before you would be a very undesirable one. Having ascer- 

 tained the pecuniary value of these rights to the United States, your 

 honors will have to ascertain the pecuniary value that British subjects 

 derive from this common trade and barter, because we ought not to pay 

 for the privilege of putting money into the hands of British subjects. 

 We ought not to pay for the privilege of enfranchising a whole class of 

 fishermen who have been held in practical serfdom by the merchants. 

 It is an exceedingly difficult subject of computation, and one which, I 

 think, you are persuaded already was never intended by the Govern- 

 ments of the United States and Great Britain to be submitted to your 

 honors for decision. I say, then, the Treaty of Washington has not 

 given us these rights. To what does the Treaty of Washington relate? 

 Without the necessity of reading it to you, I can say that the language 

 is in substance : Whereas, you have certain advantages given to you 

 relating to the inshore fisheries, under the Treaty of 1818, in regard to 

 catching fish, drying your nets, and curing your fish on certain shores, we 

 will extend territorially these same privileges. And I have the honor to 

 contend that the Treaty of Washington is simply a territorial extension 

 of certain specific rights the right to catch fish, dry nets, dry fish, and 

 cure fish. The subject-matter of that part of the Treaty of Washington 

 is the catching fish inshore, within the three-mile limit. Before the 

 Treaty of Washington, this right of catching fish within three miles of 

 shore, and of landing to dry and cure fish and dry nets, was confined 

 to certain regions. In other places we could not fish or land within the 

 three-mile limit. The Treaty of Washington extends territorially these 

 rights over all British America, and there the Treaty of Washington 

 ends, so far as the fisheries are concerned. There is not one word in it 

 of the creation of new rights. It is a territorial extension of long- 

 known specified rights. 



It does not say that whereas by the Treaty of 1818 you renounced the 

 right to fish within the three-mile limit, provided, however, that you can 

 go in to buy wood and get water, we add to those rights the right to buy 



