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who shall work the seabed in front of their territories—and give an international’ 
body the right to make money by granting exploratory and exploitation leases— 
at fee rates of its own fixing—to nationals of the state itself, as well as to: 
foreigners, in vital security areas off their own shores. 
Historically the oceans have been viewed by international law as being the 
property of no one beyond territorial limits. The right of states to control the 
use of the offshore sea has been a prerogative of sovereignty. Assertions of 
jurisdiction in the territorial sea have for the most part been exercised with 
restraint. Most states have limited claims to three and 12 miles. A small handful 
have claimed exclusive rights for as much as 100 to 200 miles. 
Claims to resources lying on or beneath the floor of the continental shelf 
date to 1945. In that year President Harry S. Truman asserted exclusive title 
to the resources of the shelf surrounding the territories of the United States. 
This was motivated by a desire to ensure national possession of mineral] re- 
sources in the shelf, and by a fishing controversy which had existed with Japan 
prior to the war. 
Other states followed suit as more was learned of the potential importance 
of resources on the continental margins. Heuador, Peru, Chile, and some other 
Latin American states utilized President Truman’s proclamation—which ex- 
plicitly disavowed claims to jurisdiction of the waters and over navigation 
above the shelf—to advance territorial claims reaching out as far as 200 miles 
from shore. Few of the states had knowledge of the resources lying on or 
beneath their shelf. In the case of Argentina, this move afforded a convenient 
additional means of claiming title to the Falkland or Malvinas Islands occupied 
by Britain. For the states on the west coast of South America it gave grounds 
for restricting the operations of foreign vessels engaged in tuna fishing off their 
coasts. 
After a decade of intensive study by national authorities and international 
legal groups, the Geneva Conference on the Law of the Sea, at which a majority 
of maritime nations were represented, agreed to a definition of the continental 
shelf which is incorporated in the Convention on this subject. 
This reads as follows: 
“  , the term ‘continental shelf’ is used as referring to the seabed and sub- 
soil of the submarine areas adjacent to the coast but outside the area of the 
territorial sea, to a depth of 200 meters or, beyond that limit, to where the 
depth of the superjacent waters admits of the exploitation of the natural 
resources of the said area. . .” 
At stake in the difference between the Commission’s proposal and the text 
of the 1958 Convention is the exploitation of the slope and the rise in which 
the continental shelf typically terminates. It now appears possible that the slope 
and rise may be important areas for mineral and energy sources; indeed, the 
U.S. Department of Interior is reported to have issued leases extending on to 
the slope. 
Within a few years the petroleum industry will have the capability of working 
on the slope. One of the wells in the Santa Barbara Channel is said to have been 
drilled in water 1,800 feet deep. And the Glomar Challenger on her recent 
voyage in the South Atlantic is reported to have drilled corings of the ocean 
floor in depths up to 19,000 feet. 
To tie the hands of industry and government in those portions of the con- 
tinental margin lying beyond the 200 meter isobath by a redefinition of the 
shelf could take away valuable resources from national control. 
There is doubt to what extent it would be advantageous to reopen the Geneva 
Convention at this time. There are more parties with interests in the shelf 
today than there were in 1958. Also, a multiplicity of interests now focus in the 
boundary of the shelf—notably defense, navigation, fishing, mining, and foreign 
affairs. Each is interlinked with the others. 
The boundary at the continental margin cannot be settled according to histori- 
eal analogies on land. Considerations of geological structure, exploitation and 
competence to employ technology are more applicable. The most vital factor 
is that the slope and rise are an integral part of the land mass of a continent. 
There is no natural dividing line. 
Where numbers of nations border upon shallow seas that extend from shore 
to shore—as along the North Sea and the South China Sea—satisfactory ar- 
rangements have been arrived at. No serious international disputes exist over 
the boundaries of the continental margins of the United States. No nation is 
challenging United States rights to control the use of the resources lying within 
its continental margin. Discussions at the United Nations relate primarily to 
the seabeds of the high seas. 
