1574 A\VAID OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 



ask for anv privilege not a fishing privilege. The question arose whether 

 we bad not still the right to fish as au innocent pursuit, even though 

 within the limit of three miles ; and the three-mile limit and what is 

 meant was not then settled. We must, however, discuss this subject as 

 if there had always been an exact law, from the times of Moses down, 

 relating to the three-mile limit and what the powers were. All this has 

 grown up within very recent times, and indeed there are very few per- 

 sons now who know "what is meant by it. It was long contended that 

 the right of all States over the three miles was for fiscal purposes, and 

 purposes of defense only, and as the subject has been very fully argued 

 in a recent case in England, nothing can probably be added to the rea- 

 sons given on each side. The matter continued in that position. We 

 fished without reference, and thought we had the right to do it. We 

 knew it did no harm. The fishermen are by the law of nations a 

 peculiar class, having special privileges. Their status is different in 

 time of war from that of a merchantman or man-of-war. Having this 

 question of the three-mile limit to deal with, one which was long dis- 

 puted between the United States and Great Britain, and one which was 

 always looked upon as disputed, which had had a slow and steady growth 

 for many years, and about which no one can dogmatize, they have en- 

 deavored to arrange it as best they could. Your honors will find that 

 in the very first treaty, that of 1783, it is stated : 



It in agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to enjoy unmolested 

 the right to take fish of every kind on the Grand Bank and on all the other Banks of 

 Newfoundland ; also in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, and at all other places in the sea 

 where the inhabitants of both countries used at any time heretofore to fish. 



That was looked upon as dealing with existing rights, the exact lim- 

 itations of which must rest solely in agreement. It was not a gift, as 

 the French gave Dunkirk to England, or as Mexico gave California to 

 the United States. It was like an adjustment of disputed territory. 

 The only question settled in the first treaty, that of 1783, was that we 

 should fish as before; nothing was said about the three-mile line. 

 When we come to the Treaty of 1818 we find it stated: "Wliereas differ- 

 ences have arisen," &c. 



By that treaty it is agreed that on certain parts of the coast we 

 shall have the right to take fish, that on certain parts we shall have the 

 right to dry and cure fish, and that at other parts we shall not have 

 Mich rights. Then came the Treaty of 1851, which said nothing about 



y of those rights of which I am speaking, but merely dealt with the 



ition of our right to fish within three miles, where we could exercise 



it and whore not, and our right to cure and dry fish and to dry nets. 



In Article IS of the Treaty of 1871 the question is taken up again in 



the name way. 



i Kr.-l by the High Contracting Parties that in addition to the liberty secured 

 fishermen by the convention between the United States and Great 

 d at London on the <>th October, 1818, for taking, curing, and drying fish 

 O.-MU, of the Hnt.sh North American colonies therein named, the inhabit- 



In- Provinces of Qaebeo, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, and col- 

 1 Island an, the several islands thereunto adjacent, without being- 

 an.-., from the shore, with permission to land upon the said coasts, 

 " SSt " 1)0 " the M P Ulen - for the P Qr POse f drying their nets 



Then it IH HtaUMl I that whereas it is claimed that Great Britain there' 



the t mUMl States more valuable fisheries than they had 



ere is something to be paid. Now, if the treaty did not give 



