cxxxiv INTRODUCTION 



however and by Treaty and in special convention the six-mile limit has frequently 

 been extended to more than six miles." ^ 



This statement was not academic, for it was intended to justify the 

 release of various Norwegian subjects who had been arrested at a point 

 more than three miles from either shore, by British officials for fishing 

 within the Moray Firth, whose entrance is more th^n double the six miles. 

 It is also worthy of note that Lord Fitzmaurice referred to past as well as 

 present practice of the government; for he refers to the law he is about 

 to state as hitherto accepted by all the departments of the government 

 chiefly concerned. Lord Fitzmaurice's language is carefully worded 

 because he speaks of the provisions of special treaties, which may be 

 modified as between the parties, and jurisdiction rightfully claimed and 

 exercised; in addition to modification by treaty of the six-mile limit in 

 the matter of bays, he 'refers to custom as frequently extending the 

 limit of maritime jurisdiction. He specifies the North Sea Convention 

 of 1882 as one which extends maritime jurisdiction as between contract- 

 ing parties to bays not more than ten miles wide at their entrance; an 

 eariier and indeed classic example of the ten-mile rule is the Treaty of 

 1839 between Great Britain and France. 



The attitude of the United States has been likewise solemnly and 

 authoritatively stated in a concrete case dealing with fisheries and involv- 

 ing the very point at issue. Thus, in the leading case of Manchester v. 

 Massachusetts (139 U. S. 240), decided in 1890, the Supreme Court used 

 the following unmistakable language: 



"The limits of the right of a nation to control the fisheries on its seacoasts, and 

 in the bays and arms of the sea within its territory, have never been placed at less 

 than a marine league from the coast on the open sea; and bays wholly within the terri- 

 tory of a nation, the headlands of which are not more than two marine leagues, or six 

 geographical miles, apart, have always been regarded as a part of the territory of the 

 nation in which they lie." . . . 



"We think it must be regarded as established that, as between nations, the mini- 

 mum limit of the territorial jurisdiction of a nation over tide-waters is a marine league 

 from its coast; that bays wholly within its territory not exceeding two marine leagues 

 in width at the mouth are within this limit; and that included in this territorial juris- 

 diction is the right of control over fisheries, whether the fish be migratory, free-swim- 

 ing fish, or free-moving fish, or fish attached to or embedded in the soil. The open 

 sea within this limit is, of course, subject to the common right of navigation; and all 

 governments, for the purpose of self-protection in time of war or for the prevention of 

 frauds on its revenue, exercise an authority beyond this limit." ' 



Great Britain and the United States seem thus to be in accord after 

 the year 1818 that the three mile limit follows the sinuosities of the 

 coast but that in the case of bays the three miles measured from shores 



» Oral Argument, Vol. 11, p. 1309. 2 139 U. S. 240, at pp. 2S7, 258. 



