QUESTION ONE. 15 



The main contention in the case is stated in subdivision (c) of the 

 statement of contentions on the part of the United States, namely, 

 that limitations or restraints on the exercise of the American right of 

 fishing can not be imposed by Great Britain, Canada, or Newfound- 

 land in the form of municipal laws, ordinances, or regulations "(c) 

 unless their appropriateness, necessity, reasonableness, and fairness 

 be determined by the United States and Great Britain by common 

 accord, and the United States concurs in their enforcement." 



The British Case distorts the question raised by that contention 

 into the following : " Stated in general terms, the question is, whether 

 certain nationals, with treaty liberty to enter alien territory and 

 do certain acts there, are exempt from all the local laws, applicable 

 to persons engaged in those acts, in force in that alien territory, un- 

 less their appropriateness, necessity, reasonableness, and fairness have 

 been passed upon, and their enforcement concurred in by the gov- 

 ernment of their own country." 



Passing by the loose terminology employed to describe a common 

 and perpetual right of fishery in its territorial waters granted by 

 one government to another, it is observed with respect to this state- 

 ment of the British Case that the United States does not now claim, 

 and has never claimed, that its nationals, when visiting the territorial 

 waters of Great Britain for the purpose of there engaging in the 

 common fishery secured to them, " are exempt from all local laws 

 applicable to persons engaged in those acts in force in that alien 

 territory, unless their appropriateness, necessity, reasonableness, and 

 fairness have been passed upon and their enforcement concurred in 

 by the government of their own country." It is not questioned 

 that inhabitants of the United States, resorting to the treaty coast 

 to fish, are bound by all local laws which do not limit or restrain 

 or burden them in the very matter of the time and manner of taking 

 fish, and hence that the great body of the civil and criminal laws of 

 Great Britain, Canada, and Newfoundland apply to the American 

 fishermen to the same extent as to other persons coming within or re- 

 siding within British jurisdiction. These propositions are not raised 

 by the Questions submitted for decision and have never been and are 

 not now contested by the United States. 



Passing for the moment the question of the proper interpretation 

 to be placed on certain words and phrases of the treaty, and assum- 



British Case, 20. 



