ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 5 



At the outset of the consideration as to where that line is to 

 be drawn, and how it is to be drawn, there is plainly to be seen one 

 fact, unquestionable, agreed to on all hands: that the contention 

 of the United States does not in any degree whatever thrust the 

 assertion of its right into the field of British sovereignty in general. 

 It does not question the full and unimpeded exercise of the sovereign 

 rights of Great Britain over her territory, and the people within 

 her territory, in all the general affairs of life. It does not question 

 her controlj without accountabiUty, over the conduct of all persons 

 who are within the spatial sphere of her sovereignty. 



It is a familiar method of deaUng with the arguments of an ad- 

 versary to overstate them, for the purpose of destroying them; and 

 when the claims of the United States are stated as being claims 

 to an abdication of British sovereignty, I cannot help feeUng that 

 the statement trenches a Uttle upon that method of argument. It 

 constructs a man of straw, easily overthrown. It creates a certain 

 degree of prejudice against the claim which, stated in such a form, 

 is to remain during the period of a long argument characterized by 

 such a description. We make no such claim. We admit unre- 

 stricted and unquestioned sovereignty by Great Britain over 

 persons and their conduct; but our claim questions whether that 

 sovereignty, since the grant to us, extends to a modification of our 

 right. The American inhabitant who goes to the treaty coast for 

 the exercise of his right is absolutely and in the fullest extent subject 

 to the sovereignty of Great Britain; but what is his right? Can 

 Great Britain change his right ? His conduct in exercising the right, 

 yes; he must obey the laws. But can it change his right? It is 

 conceded — for certain purposes of argument asserted — asserted 

 in the printed documents, asserted by the coimsel for Great Britain 

 here, and repeated over and over again, with emphasis, that there 

 is a line beyond which Great Britain caimot go. Where is the 

 line? 



Let me call attention to three expressions as to the existence 

 of the line beyond which Great Britain cannot go, which appear 

 in the record, and which are progressively definitive. I will begin 

 with the do^ular of Mr. Marcy, with which the Tribunal is very 

 familiar, ^nd which appears in the British Case Appendix at 



p. 207. f he Tribunal will remember that Mr. Marcy, the American 



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