570 APPENDIX TO GASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
force pending the negotiations, and in so far as it was not modified by 
the Conventions. A claim of jurisdiction over the open sea, which is 
not in accordance with the recognized principles of international law 
or usage, may, of course, be asserted by force, but cannot be said to 
have any legal validity as against the vessels of other countries, except 
in so far as it is positively admitted by Conventional Agreements with 
those countries. 
I do not suppose that it is necessary that I should argue at length 
upon so elementary a point as that a claim to prohibit the vessels of 
other nations from approaching within a distance of 100 miles from the 
coast is contrary to modern international usage. Mr. Adams and Mr. 
Canning clearly thought in 1825 that the matter was beyond doubt or 
discussion. 
The rule which was recognized at that time, and which has been gen- 
erally admitted both by publicists and Governments, limits the juris- 
diction of a country in the open sea to a distance of 3 miles from its 
coasts, this having been considered to be the range of a cannon-shot 
when the principle was adopted. 
Wheaton, who may be regarded as a contemporary authority, equally 
respected in Europe and America, says: 
The maritime territory of every State extends to the ports, harbours, bays, mouths 
of rivers, and adjacent parts of the sea inclosed by headlands belonging to the same 
State. The general usage of nations superadds to this extent of territorial jurisdic- 
tion a distance of a marine league, or as far as a cannon-shot will reach trom the 
shore along all the coasts of the State. 
And again— 
The rule of law on this subject is terre dominium finitur ubi finitur armorum vis; and 
since the introduction of fire-arms that distance has usually been recognized to be 
about 3 miles from the shore. 
Chancellor Kent, who is inclined to advocate a more extended limit, 
still admits that: 
According to the current of modern authority, the general territorial jurisdiction 
extends into the sea as far as cannon-shot will reach, and no far ther; and this is gen- 
erally calculated to be a marine league. 
Calvo, one of the most recent text-writers, makes a corresponding 
statement: 
Les limites juridictionnelles @’un Etat embrassent non seulement son territoire, 
mais encore les eaux qui le traversent ou Ventourent, les ports, les baies, les golfes, 
le sembouchures des fleuves et les mers enclayées dans son territoire. L’usage gén- 
éral des nations permet également aux Etats @exercer leur juridiction sur Ta zone 
maritime jusqu’a 3 mille marins ou & la portée de canon de leurs cétes. 
3ut L need scarcely appeal to any other authority than that of the 
United States Government itself. 
In a note to the Spanish Minister, dated the 16th December, 1862, 
on the subject of the Spanish claim to a 6-mile limit at sea, Mr. Seward 
stated : * 
A third principle bearing on the subject is also well established, namely, that this 
exclusive sovereignty of a nation—thus abridging the universal liberty of the seas—— 
extends no farther than the power of the nation to maintain it by force, stationed 
on the coast, extends. This principle | is tersely expressed in the maxim: “ Terre 
dominium jinitur ubi jinitur armorum vis. 
But it must always be a matter of uncertainty and dispute at what point the 
force of arms, exerted on the coast, can actually reach. The publicists rather 
advanced towards than reached a solution when they laid down the rule that the 
limit of the force is the range of a cannon-ball. The range of a cannon-ball is 
shorter or longer according to the circumstances of projection, “and it must be always 
liable to change with the improvement of the science of ordnance. Such uncer- 
* Wharton’s International Law Digest, vol.i, § 32. 
