r PROCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY 



HELD AT PHILADELPHIA " 

 FOR PROMOTING USEFUL KNOWLEDGE 



Vol. XLVIII September-December, ]909 No. 193. 



THE AMERICAN-BRITISH ATLANTIC FISHERIES 

 QUESTION. 



By THOMAS WILLING BALCH. 



{Read April 22, iQog.) 



When the thirteen original colonies and the mother land closed in 

 1783 by the Treaty of Paris the civil war that had raged between 

 them since 1775, and the United States were recognized by Great 

 Britain as a member of the family of nations, both parties thought 

 that, by that treaty of partition of 1783, they had arranged all 

 the differences then existing between them. But during the cen- 

 tury and a quarter that has elapsed since the Treaty of Paris was 

 signed, the United States and Great Britain have been engaged in 

 endless discussions and arguments concerning the proper interpreta- 

 tion of that treaty. Among these mooted questions, that of the 

 Atlantic fisheries has been a fruitful bone of contention between the 

 two leading Anglo-Saxon powers. At length, just as so many other 

 points of difference between these two nations have been settled 

 in peace by a reference to international arbitration, so this question 

 of the Atlantic fisheries is to be so arranged by referring it to the 

 decision of The Hague International Court. This sensible and 

 humane agreement of two great powers to refer the solution of this 

 question to that august tribunal instead of allowing it to become a 

 cause of war, will be another " mile stone " in the evolution of inter- 



PROC. AMER. PHIL. SOC, Xl-VIH. I93 V, PRINTED JANUARY 4, I9IO. 



