564 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
from Mr. Adams’ despatch of the 22nd July, 1823. He contends that 
these words give a different meaning to the despatch, and that the lat- 
ter does not refute, but actually supports, the present claim of the 
United States. It becomes necessary, therefore, that | should refer in 
greater detail to the correspondence, an examination of which will show 
that the passage in question can not have the signification which Mr. 
Blaine seeks to give to it, that the words omitted by me do not in 
reality affect the point at issue, and that the view which he takes of 
the attitude both of Great Britain and of the United States towards 
the claim put forward by Russia in 1822 cannot be reconciled with the 
tenour of the despatches. 
It appears from the published papers that in 1799 the Emperor Paul I 
granted by Charter to the Russian American Company the exclusive 
right of hunting, trade, industries, and discoveries of new land on the 
northwest coast of America from Behring’s Strait to the 55th degree 
of north latitude, with permission to the C ompany to extend their ‘dis- 
coveries to the south and to form establishments there, provided they 
did not encroach upon the territory occupied by other Powers. 
The southern limit thus provisionally assigned to the Company cor- 
responds, within 20 or 30 miles, with that which was eventually agreed 
upon as the boundary between the British and Russian possessions. 
It comprises not only the whole American coast of Behring’s Sea, but a 
long reach of coast-line to the south of the Alaskan Peninsula as far as 
the level of the southern portion of Prince of Wales’ Island. 
The Charter, which was issued at atime of great European excite- 
ment, attracted apparently little attention at the moment, and gave 
rise to no remonstrance. It made no claim to exclusive jurisdiction 
over the sea, 1ror do any measures appear to have been taken under it 
to restrict the commerce, navigation, or fishery of the subjects of foreign 
nations. But in September 1821 the Russian Government issued a 
fresh Ukase, of which the provisions material to the present discussion 
were as follows: 
Section 1. The pursuits of commerce, whaling, and fishing, andof all other industry, 
on all islands, ports, and gulfs, ineluding the whole of the north-west coast of Amer- 
ica, beginning from Behring’s Strait to “the 51st degree of northern latitude; also 
from the Aleutian Islands to the eastern coast of Siberia, as well as along the Kurile 
Islands from Behring’s Strait to the south cape of the Island of Urup, viz., to 45° 50’ 
northern latitude, are exclusively granted to Russian subjects. 
Sec. 2. It is therefore prohibited to all foreign vessels not only to land on the coasts 
and islands belonging to Russia, as stated above, but also to approach them within 
less than 100 Italian miles. The transgressor’s vessel is subject to confiscation, along 
with the whole cargo. 
By this Ukase the exclusive dominion claimed by Russia on the 
American Continent was pushed some 250 miles to the south as 
513 far as Vancouver Island, and notice was for the first time given 
of a claim to maritime jurisdiction which was regarded both in 
England and the United States as extravagant, or, to use Lord Sto- 
Ww ell’s description of it, “very unmeasured and insupportable. y 
Upon receiving communication of the Ukase, the British and United 
States Governments at once objected both to the extension of the ter- 
ritorial claim and to the assertion of maritime jurisdiction. For the 
present, I will refer only to the protest of the United States Govern- 
ment. This was made ina note from Mr. John Quincy Adams, then 
Secretary of State, to the Russian Representative, dated the 25th Feb- 
ruary, 1822, which contains the following statement: 
I am directed by the President of the United States to inform you that he has seen 
with surprise in this Edict the assertion of a territorial claim on the part of Russia 
aff 
