584 THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEA 



of that opinion from the accredited writers on the law of 

 nations whose works were then available, or from the general 

 usage of nations apart from Anglo-American practice. The 

 Russian Government were obviously not satisfied on the point, 

 and their instruction to their naval commanders to enforce the 

 limit of cannon range, though that was a less definite boundary, 

 was more in consonance with the law of nations as generally 

 understood. It was natural that the British Government should 

 give weight to the decisions of Lord Stowell in the Admiralty 

 Court. 



The Government of the United States, in discussing the 

 Russian pretension, did not apparently lay the same stress on 

 the principle of the three-mile limit as they did on some other 

 occasions. The claim that the Northern Pacific might strictly 

 be regarded as a closed sea was met by the simple statement 

 that the opposite coasts on the parallel of 51 degrees were 

 4000 miles apart. The right of American subjects to navigate 

 and fish within the prescribed distance of 100 miles from the 

 coast was rested on continuous exercise from the earliest times. 

 Universal usage, it was declared, which had obtained the force 

 of law, had established for all coasts "an accessory limit of 

 a moderate distance" which was sufficient for the security of 

 the country and for the convenience of its inhabitants, but 

 which laid no restraint upon the universal right of nations, 

 nor upon the freedom of commerce and of navigation. 1 



In the conventions which followed, it was provided that the 

 subjects of the contracting Powers should not be molested 

 either in navigating or in fishing in any part of the Pacific 

 Ocean, and they were to be at liberty for ten years to frequent 

 without hindrance all the inland seas, gulfs, havens, and 

 creeks, on the coasts mentioned, for the purpose of fishing 

 and of trading with the natives, subject to certain conditions 

 to prevent illicit commerce. 2 



It may be here stated that some years later, when American 

 and British whalers had greatly increased in numbers in 



1 American State Papers, Foreign Relations, v. 452 ; Parl. Papers, ibid., App. II. 

 pt. ii. No. 5 ; Wheaton, Elements, 308. 



2 Treaty between Russia and the United States, April 17th, 1824, Art. i. iv. ; 

 treaty between Great Britain and Russia, 28th Feb. 1825, Art. i. vii. Martens, 

 Nouv. Recueil, vi. 684. Parl. Papers, ibid., 52, 53. 



