THE FUR-SEALS AND THE BERING SEA AWARD 39 



loses no property rights in the bees when the}*- fly away to 

 gather honey in fields other than his own ; but, upon the 

 same principle, it might be pertinently asked could Canada 

 claim in the United States the flocks of wild geese and ducks 

 that are hatched and bred about the northern Canadian 

 lakes but pass the winter seasons in the United States ; or, 

 could the United States claim in Canada the deer, elk, or 

 buffalo that cross for a day the northern frontier? 



The seals could be considered domestic animals only by a 

 strain of the imagination, and as animals ferce naturce they 

 are born and live for a period of time each year on American 

 soil, and when they take their departure it is always with the 

 intention of returning. By analogous arguments, therefore, 

 from common law sources, the United States might have been 

 shown to possess a qualified property right in these animals, 

 sufficient even to warrant their protection when outside of 

 American jurisdiction upon the high seas. But to have 

 established such a right in the United States would have 

 been to recognize and to tolerate a violation of much better 

 established principles of international law, the absolute 

 freedom of the high seas. 



The arbitrators (the American commissioners dissenting) 

 decided against the American contention, holding, "That 

 the United States have no right to protection of, or property 

 in, the seals frequenting the islands of the United States in 

 Bering Sea, when the same are found outside the ordinary 

 three-mile limit." 



Thus the American case was lost upon each and every legal 

 point involved. The- United States was held to possess no 

 greater right in Bering Sea than was possessed in common by 

 all nations. The seals were considered to be animals strictly 

 ferce naturce, and consequently, res nullius, or incapable of 

 ownership when outside of national jurisdiction, or upon the 

 high seas. 



Therefore all nations had a natural and perfect right to 

 catch these animals in any open sea, and consequently if any 

 restrictions upon these rights, or any regulations of sealing, 

 were to be effected, such could properly be made only through 



