1696 AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 



when the American supply fails and fish become very scarce. I am 

 sure that when I began the investigation of this case, I should have 

 thought that it was in the main true that as fish became scarce on the 

 American coast, and from the American fishermen in the bay every- 

 where, the British fishermen coming in there could perhaps afford to 

 pay the duty and still sell. But such is not the result. The figures 

 have showr/it. That has been proved. The difficulty is, that mackerel 

 is not a necessity. It is not British mackerel against American mack- 

 erel, but it is British salted mackerel against every eatable thing in na- 

 ture that a man will take to rather than pay very high prices. And 

 it is true that fresh fish are more valuable and more desirable than salt 

 fish; that fresh fish are increasing in number; that they are brought 

 into market in quantities, ten, twenty, a hundred per cent, larger than 

 they ever were before, and that the value of the salted mackerel is 

 steadily and uniformly decreasing. 



They brought men here also, who stated, under the same influence, 

 that they would rather see the duties restored, and have the three-mile 

 fishery exclusively to themselves, than to have what they now have. 

 But I observed that the question was always put to them in one form, 

 " Would you rather have the two-dollar duty restored f The question 

 was never asked them, " Would you rather go back to the state of things 

 when the United States could put what duty upon your fish they might 

 see fit, and preserve your monopoly of the three miles?" No man would 

 have answered that question in the affirmative. I venture to say, may 

 it please this learned tribunal, that no man of decent intelligence and fair 

 honesty could have answered any such question affirmatively. And those 

 who said they would rather go back to the same state of things, testi- 

 fied under a great deal of bias ; they testified under a very strong inter- 

 est, on a subject right under their eyes, which they felt daily, and which 

 they may have been made to feel by the urgency of others. They did 

 not sntt'er at all. It was not they who suffered from the attempt to 

 exclude us. It was amusement to them, though it might have been 

 death to some of us; and they imagined that if they did not have the 

 duty to pay, which they all based their answer upon, of course they 

 would rather go back to free trade and exclusion, for in their minds it 

 amounted to that. They had not the duty to pay, although one was 

 laid, and of course with no duty to pay, they would rather go back to 

 that old state of things, and have the exclusive right to fish within three 

 miles. I think that illusion may be safely predicated of nearly all the 

 witnesses brought upon the opposite side by the counsel for the Crown. 



A good deal of time was taken up on each side in presenting extracts 

 from the speeches of politicians and parliamentarians, and men in Con- 

 gress, as to what was the real value of free trade in fish, and the real 

 value of the right to fish within three miles. Some extracts were read 

 by the learned counsel for the Crown, from speeches made by certain 

 members of the American Congress, who had a point to carry, and 

 some arguments much stronger were produced by us from members 

 of the Dominion Government who also had a point to carry. I do 

 not attach the very highest importance to either of them. I hope I am 

 guilty of no disrespect to the potentates and powers that be, in saying 

 that, because 1 have always observed that men in public life who have 

 points to carry will usually find arguments by which to carry them, and 

 eir position is not very different from that of counsel, not before 

 riband, but counsel in court, strictly speaking, who have a point 

 to maintain, and who have a verdict to get, because, woe to the states- 

 whose argument results in a majority of negatives, because he and 

 H whole party, under the Dominion system, go out of power. It is not 



