ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 173 



You will see there carried on the idea that the admission of 

 Americans was an interference with administration and an aban- 

 donment of control. For that reason they wanted to shove them 

 ofi to these unfrequented and practically imsettled coasts. 



Mr. Monroe decHned each of these offers, and Mr. Bagot came 

 back with a letter on the 31st December, 1816, in which he offered 

 both of these stretches which he had formerly offered in the alterna-. 

 tive. The letter is on p. 292 of the United States Case Appendix^ 

 and in it he says: 



"The object of His Majesty's Government, in framing these proposi- 

 tions, was to endeavor to assign to the American fishermen, in the prosecution 

 of their employment, as large a participation of the conveniences afforded 

 by the neighboring coasts of His Majesty's settlements as might be recon- 

 cilable with the just' rights and interests of His Majesty's own subjects, 

 and the due administration of His Majesty's dominions. " 



Mr. Monroe decHned that proposition, and when the negotiators 

 came together (the negotiations having been kept open by expres- 

 sions of good intentions of both parties) the American negotiators 

 presented a third proposition, which is the one now in the treaty, 

 which took in both the Labrador coast and the south coast of New- 

 foundland, that had been offered, first, alternatively, and, second, 

 collectively; and also the west coast of Newfoundland. They 

 presented that on the 17th September, 1818, and on that same day 

 Messrs. Robinson and Goulburn, the British negotiators, reported 

 to their government the reasons given by the Americans for the 

 action which they took; and that appears at p. 86 of the British 

 Case Appendix. I shall be very glad to have your Honor's atten- 

 tion to that letter. This is the letter not dated, except September, 

 but which I have already observed, is located as of the 17 th by 

 reference to the protocols of that day. Reading about one-third 

 down, the third paragraph on p. 86, the writers say: 



"With respect to the fisheries they observed" — 



that is, the American Commissioners observed — 



"that in consideration of the different opinions known to be entertained by 

 the governments of the two countries, as to the right of the United States 

 to a participation in the fisheries within the British jurisdiction, and to the 

 use for those purposes of British territory, they had been induced to forego 



