644 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
instances is the case) American citizens, refusing obedience to the laws of their 
own country, have gone into partnership with the British flag and engaged in the 
destruction of the seal fisheries which belong to the United States. So general, so 
notorious, and so shamelessly avowed has this practice become that last season, 
according to the Report of the American Consul at Victoria, when the intruders 
assembled at Ounalaska on the 4th July, previous to entering Behring’s Sea, the day 
was celebrated in a patriotic and spirited manner by the American citizens, who, at 
the time, were protected by the British flag in their violation of the laws of their 
own country. 
With such agencies as these, devised by the Dominion of Canada and protected by 
the flag of Great Britain, American rights and interests have, within the past four 
years, been damaged to the extent of millions of dollars, with no corresponding 
gain to those who caused the loss. From 1870 to 1890 the seal fisheries—carefully 
guarded and preserved—yielded 100,000 skins each year. The Canadian intrusions 
began in 1886, and so great has been the damage resulting from their destruction of 
seal life in the open sea surrounding the Pribyloff Islands, that in 1890 the Govern- 
ment of the United States limited the Alaska Company to 60,000 seals. But the Com- 
pany was able to secure only 21,000 seals. Under the same evil influences that have 
been active now for five seasons the seal fisheries will soon be utterly destroyed. 
Great Britain has been informed, advised, warned over and over again, of the evil 
effects that would flow from her course of action; but, against testimony that 
55 amounts to demonstration, she has preferred to abide by personal representations 
from Ottawa, by Reports of Commissioners who examined nothing, and heard 
nothing, except the testimony of those engaged in the business against which the 
United States has earnestly protested. She may possibly be convinced of the damage 
if she will send an intelligent Commissioner to the Pribyloff Islands. 
In general answer to all these facts, Great Britain announces that she is willing 
te settle the dispute by arbitration. Her proposition is contained in the following 
paragraph, which I quote in full: 
“T have to request that you will communicate a copy of this despatch, and of its 
inclosures, to Mr. Blaine. You will state that Her Majesty’s Government have no 
desire whatever to refuse to the United States any jurisdiction in Behring’s Sea 
which was conceded by Great Britain to Russia, and which properly accrues to the 
present possessors of Alaska in virtue of Treaties or the law of nations; and that, 
if the United States Government, after examination of the evidence and arguments 
which I have produced, still differ from them as to the legality of the recent cap- 
tures in that sea, they are ready to agree that the question, with the issues that 
depend upon it, should be referred to impartial arbitration. You will in that case 
be authorized to consider, in concert with Mr. Blaine, the method of procedure to 
be followed.” 
In his annual Message, sent to Congress on the Ist of the present month, the Presi- 
dent, speaking in relation to the Behring’s Sea question, said: 
“The offer to submit the question to arbitration, as proposed by Her Majesty’s 
Government, has not been accepted, for the reason that the form of submission pro- 
posed is not thought to be calculated to assure a conclusion satisfactory to either 
party.” 
In the judgment of the President, nothing of importance would be settled by 
proving that Great Britain conceded no jurisdiction to Russia over the seal fisheries 
of the Behring’s Sea. It might aswell be proved that Russia conceded no jurisdic- 
tion to England over the River Thames. By doingnothing in each case everything is 
conceded. Inneithercase is anything asked of the other. ‘ Concession,” asused here, 
means simply acquiescence in the rightfulness of the title, and that is the only form 
of concession which Russia asked of Great Britain, or which Great Britain gave to 
ltussia. 
The second offer of Lord Salisbury to arbitrate amounts simply to a submission of 
the question whether any country has a right to extend its jurisdiction more than 
one marine league from the shore? No one disputes that, as a rule; but the question 
is whether there may not be exceptions whose enforcement does not interfere with 
those highways of commerce which the necessities and usage of the world have 
marked out. Great Britain, when she desired an exception, did not stop to consider 
or regard the inconvenience to which the commercial world might be subjected. 
Her exception placed an obstacle in the highway between continents. The United 
States, in protecting the seal fisheries, will not interfere with a single sail of com- 
merce on any sea of the globe. 
It will mean something tangible, in the President’s opinion, if Great Britain will 
consent to arbitrate the real questions which have been under discussion between the 
two Governments for the last four years. I shall endeavor to state what, in the 
judgment of the President, those issues are: 
1. What exclusive jurisdiction in the sea now known as the Behring’s Sea, and 
what exclusive rights in the seal fisheries therein, did Russia assert and exercise 
prior and up to time of the cession of Alaska to the United States? 
