628 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
namely, the legality of the seizures of British vessels in the Behring’s 
Sea outside of territorial waters, they express their willingness to sub- 
mit to arbitration certain historical and political questions which, in 
my humble opinion, would raise false issues, however pertinent they 
may be as supplying materials for argument in support of the Ameri- 
can contention. For, even if all those questions were decided in favour 
of the United States, it would not follow that the seizures were justi- 
fied, or that the claim of the United States to the control of any part 
of the Behring’s Sea outside of territorial waters could be supported 
by international law. 
I have, &c. 
(Signed) JULIAN PAUNCEFOTE, 
[Inclosure in No. 19.] 
Mr. Blaine to Sir J. Pauncefote. 
DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, December 17, 1890. 
Srr: Your note of the 12th August, which I acknowledged on the Ist September, 
inclosed a copy of a despatch from the Marquis of Salisbury, dated the 2nd August, 
in reply to my note of the 50th June. 
The consideration advanced by his Lordship have received the careful attention 
of the President, and I am instructed to insist upon the correctness and validity of 
the position which has been earnestly advocated by the Government of the United 
States in defence of American rights in the Behring’s Sea. 
Legal and diplomatic questions, apparently complicated, are often found, after 
prolonged discussion, to depend on the settlement of a single point. Such, in the 
judgment of the President,is the position in which the United States and Great 
Britain find themselves in the pending controversy touching the true construction 
of the Russo-American and Anglo-Russian Treaties of 1824 and 1825. Great Britain 
contends that the phrase ‘‘ Pacific Ocean,” as used in the Treaties, was intended to 
include, and does include, the body of water which is now known as the Behring’s 
Sea. The United States contends that the Behring’s Sea was not mentioned, or even 
referred to, in either Treaty, and was in no sense included in the phrase “ Pacific 
Ocean.” If Great Britain can maintain her position that the Behring’s Sea at the 
time of the Treaties with Russia of 1824 and 1825 was included in the Pacific Ocean, 
the Government of the United States has no well-grounded complaint against her. 
If, on the other hand, this Government can prove beyond all doubt that the Behring’s 
Sea, at the date of the Treaties, was understood by the three Signatory Powers 
38 to be a separate body of water, and was not included in the phrase ‘ Pacific 
Ocean,” then the American case against Great Britain is complete and unde- 
niable. 
The dispute prominently involves the meaning of the phrase ‘‘ north-west coast,” 
or ‘north-west coast of America.” Lord Salisbury assumes that the “north-west 
coast” has but one meaning, and that it includes the whole coast stretching north- 
ward to the Behring’s Straits. The contention of this Government is that by long 
prescription the ‘‘north-west coast” means the coast of the Pacific Ocean south of 
the Alaskan Peninsula, or south of the 60th parallel of north latitude; or, to define it 
still more accurately, the coast, from the northern border of the Spanish possessions, 
ceded to the United States in 1819, to the point where the Spanish claims met the 
claims of Russia, viz., from 42° to 60° north latitude. The Russian authorities for 
a long time assumed that 59° 30’ was the exact point of latitude, but subsequent 
adjustments fixed it at 60°. The phrase ‘‘north-west coast,” or ‘‘north-west coast 
of America,” has been well known and widely recognized in popular usage in Eng- 
land and America from the date of the first trading to that coast, about 1784.* So 
absolute has been this prescription that the distinguished historian Hubert Howe 
Bancroft has written an accurate history of the north-west coast, which at different 
times, during a period of seventy-five years, was the scene of important contests 
between at leastfour Great Powers. To render the understanding explicit, Mr. Ban- 
croft has illustrated the north-west coast by a carefully prepared Map. The Map 
*The same designation obtained in Europe. As early as 1803, in a Map published 
by the Geographic Institute at Weimar, the coast from Columbia River (49°) to 
Cape Elizabeth (60°) is designated as the “ Nérd West Kuste.” 
