INTRODUCTION cxxi 



Expressions of like import are to be found in the correspondence of 

 the period between the conclusion of the War of 1 812 and the negotiation 

 of the Convention of 18 18, and these expressions become material when 

 it is learned that the various documents in which they were contained 

 passed between the two governments and were submitted to the com- 

 missioners of both countries for their guidance.' 



In a letter from Lord Castlereagh to the British commissioners at 

 Ghent, dated July 28, 1814, His Lordship stated that 



"the third Article of the Treaty [of 1783] consists of two distinct branches: The 

 first, which relates to the open sea fishery, we consider a permanent obUgation, 

 being a recognition of the general right wliich all nations have to frequent and talce 

 fish in the high seas.'' 



In speaking of the second branch of the fishery he stated that Great 

 Britain did not feel called upon "to concede to the Americans any 

 accommodation within the British sovereignty; ... it being quite clear 

 that, by the law of nations, the subjects of a foreign State have no right 

 to fish within the maritime jurisdiction, much less to land on the coasts 

 belonging to His Britannic Majesty, without an express permission to 

 that effect.'"* 



In a note from Lord Bathurst, who acted for the Foreign Office in 

 the absence of Lord Castlereagh, Lord Bathurst instructed the com- 

 missioners at Ghent as follows: 



"You are to state that Great Britain admits the right of the United States to fish 

 on the high seas without the maritime jurisdiction of the territorial possessions of Great 

 Britain in North America; that the extent of the maritime jurisdiction of the two 

 contracting parties must be reciprocal; that Great Britain is ready to enter into an 

 arrangement on that point; and that, until any arrangement shall be made to the 

 contrary, the usual maritime jurisdiction of one league, shall be common to. both con- 

 tracting parties." • 



In a subsequent instruction, dated December 6, 1814, Lord Bathurst, 



ions' in the renunciatory clause must be read as including only those bays which were 

 under the territorial sovereignty of Great Britain. 



"But the Tribunal is unable to accept this contention: 



" (a) Because the description of the coast on which the fishery is to be exercised by the 

 inhabitants of the United States is expressed throughout the treaty of 1818 in geographical 

 terms and not by reference to political control; the treaty described the coast as contained 

 between capes. 



" (J) Because to express the political concept of dominion as equivalent to sovereignty, the 

 word 'dominion' in the singular would have been an adequate term and not 'dominions' in the 

 plural; this latter term having a recognized and well settled meaning as descriptive of those 

 portions of the earth which owe poUtical allegiance to His Majesty, e.g., ' His Britannic Majesty's 

 Dominions beyond the Seas.' " (Appendix, p. 509; Oral Argument, p. 1452.) 



'Appendix, U. S. Case, p. 304; Appendix, British Case, p. 85. 



' Oral Argument, Vol. II, p. 1356. 



' Lord Bathurst to the Commissioners at Ghent, October 18, 1814. (Oral Argument, Vol. 

 n, P- 1358.) 



