INTRODUCTION cvii 



appear advantageous or advisable, because fishermen, it seems, are prone 

 to take fish wherever found, notwithstanding the terms of a convention, 

 and such action would give rise to a controversy which it was the purpose 

 of the convention to prevent. In order to remove any doubt about the 

 nature and extent of the permission, the purposes were enumerated and 

 followed by the express statement that American fishermen were to be 

 admitted within the non-treaty waters "for no other purposes whatever." 

 But the right to regulate the entry and sojourn of American fishermen 

 within the Treaty waters for the four specified purposes was, in con- 

 tradistinction from the exercise of the fishing liberty within treaty 

 waters, expressly reserved, and this express provision seemed to American 

 counsel to indicate that the liberty to fish within treaty waters was to be 

 free from British regulation, as otherwise they would have reserved the 

 right to regulate as in the case of admission to non-treaty waters. The 

 clause in question is that American fishermen "shall be under such 

 restrictions as may be necessary to prevent their taking, drying, or curing 

 fish therein, or in any other manner whatever abusing the privileges 

 hereby reserved to them." 



An examination, however, of this clause shows that the purpose of 

 the negotiators was two-fold: first, to prevent American fishermen. from 

 "taking, drying, or curing fish therein"; second, or in any other manner 

 to abuse the four specified privileges. The right of Great Britain to 

 issue regulations is too clear for argument, but it would seem equally 

 clear that the regulations should not be of such a character as to render 

 the grant nugatory. American fishermen could only properly enter the 

 non-treaty waters when in distress or to obtain supplies regarded as 

 indispensable to the prosecution of the fishing liberty. That is to say, 

 to obtain shelter, to repair damages; to purchase wood and obtain 

 water. In such cases delay might render entrance impossible and to 

 impose restrictions upon vessels in distress might deprive the fishermen 

 of the benefit which the convention evidently meant to convey. Such 

 a provision was largely of a humanitarian nature and should be inter- 

 preted in the broad and generous spirit of the grant. This is evident in 

 the matter of shelter, and it would seem that entry to repair damages 

 should be generously construed. It may be that the fisherman might 

 have foreseen such circumstances and supplied himself with material 

 necessary to make repairs. But to compel him to do so might interfere 

 with the successful prosecution of the voyage, and in any case if repairing 

 was necessary the right to resort to the bays and harbors of the non- 

 treaty coast should be granted. In the same way a narrow and literal 

 construction might deny the right to enter to purchase wood, for the 



