NORTH ATLANTIC FISHERIES DISPUTE S5 



British, Chesapeake and Delaware Bays, which belong to the United 

 States, and others {ibid, page 188). The Institute of International Law 

 in its annual meeting of 1894, recommended a marginal belt of six miles 

 for the general line of the coast and as a consequence established that for 

 bays the line should be drawn up across at the nearest portion of the 

 entrance toward the sea where the distance between the two sides do not 

 exceed twelve miles. But the learned association very wisely added a 

 proviso to the effect, "that bays sliould be so considered and measured 

 unless a coHtiniious and established usage has sanctioned a greater 

 breadth." ]\Iany great authorities are agreed as to that. Counsel for 

 the United States proclaimed the right to the exclusive jurisdiction of 

 certain bays, no matter what the width of their entrance should be, 

 when the littoral nation has asserted its right to take it into their juris- 

 diction upon reasons which go always back to the doctrine of protection. 

 Lord Blackburn, one of the most eminent of English judges, in deliver- 

 ing the opinion of the Privy Council about Conception Bay in Newfound- 

 land, adhered to the same doctrine when he asserted the territoriality of 

 that branch of the sea, giving as a reason for such finding "that the 

 British Government for a long period had exercised dominion over this 

 bay and its claim had been acquiesced in by other nations, so as to show 

 that the bay had been for a long time occupied exclusively by Great 

 Britain, a circumstance which, in the tribunals of any country, would be 

 very important." "And moreover," he added, "the British Legislature 

 has, by Acts of Parliament, declared it to be part of the British territory, 

 and parts of the country made subject to the legislation of Newfound- 

 land." (Direct U. S. Cable Co. v. The Anglo-American Telegraph Co., 

 Law Reports, 2 Appeal Cases, 374.) 



So it may be safely asserted that a certain class of bays, which might 

 be properly called the historical bays such as Chesapeake Bay and Dela- 

 ware Bay in North America and the great estuary of the River Plate in 

 South America, form a class distinct and apart and undoubtedly belong 

 to the littoral country, whatever be their depth of penetration and the 

 width of their mouths, when such country has asserted its sovereignty 

 over them, and particiilar circumstances such as geographical configura- 

 tion, immemorial usage and above all, the requirements of self-defense, 

 justify such a pretension. The rights of Great Britain over the bays of 

 Conception, Chaleur and Miramichi are of this description. In what 

 refers to the other bays, as might be termed the common, ordinary bays, 

 indenting the coasts, over which no special claim or assertion of sov- 

 ereignty has been made, there does not seem to be any other general 

 principle to be applied than the one resulting from the custom and 

 usage of each individual nation as shown by their Treaties and their 

 general and time honoured practice. 



