1 86 FISHERIES ARBITRATION AT THE HAGUE 



from the people of Newfoundland, because I have been there, and, 

 with them, have shot caribou in their wilderness and killed salmon 

 in their streams, accompanied by Newfoundlanders. We were 

 exercising privileges in common and with no limitation upon one 

 that was not upon the other. We could fish together, buy and sell, 

 borrow and lend, give and take without restriction; we could have 

 fished from the same boat, could have drawn the seine upon the 

 same strand, we could have employed one or another in each other's 

 service. I was mingUng with the people of Newfoundland as an 

 individual because I was going there under the privilege of a general 

 right of intercourse which obtains among all civiHzed nations, 

 declared and expressed in the treaty of 1815 and in this treaty of 

 1818. 



But how different would have been the situation had I gone as 

 an American fisherman upon an American ship! Then I would 

 have been a member of a class set apart by itself, not sharing in 

 any of the common opportunities, or advantages, or privileges of 

 the people of Newfoundland. If I had fished from the same boat 

 as a Newfoundlander he would have been arrested, tried, and con- 

 victed. If we drew a seine together upon the same strand, punish- 

 ment would follow to him, or confiscation to my vessel. If I say 

 that I want bait or the implements of fishing, I cannot obtain them 

 but at the risk of criminality on his part. 



One right is a right in which the individual mingles with the 

 community subject to the same laws and entitled to the same oppor- 

 tunities. There are millions of people, natives of one country, who 

 are living so in peace in the other countries of the earth to-day; 

 but under the other right there is a special class set apart with none 

 of these opportunities, to be held down narrowly and rigidly to 

 the precise right that is found within the four corners of the treaty. 

 Laws and regulations which are bound to operate equally upon 

 individuals are bound, in the working of human nature, to operate 

 unequally when established by one class as against another class. 

 There is a radical and perpetual distinction between the two, and 

 for months here counsel for Great Britain have been seeking to 

 drive into your minds an impression which would lead you to read 

 into the treaty of 1818, as to the fishing grant, considerations appro- 

 priate only to the exercise of the other kind of right which can be 



