2o6 FISHERIES ARBITRATION AT THE HAGUE 



He next proceeds to the second question, and upon that he 



says: 



"But it cannot be claimed, consistently with this right of participation 

 in common with the British fishermen, that the United States fishermen 

 have any olher, and still less that they have greater rights than the British 

 fishermen had at the date of the treaty." 



I am now reading about two-thirds of the way down p. 685: 



"If, then, at the date of the signature of the Treaty of Washington, cer- 

 tain restraints were, by the municipal law, imposed upon the British fishermen, 

 the United States fishermen were, by the express terms of the treaty, equally 

 subjected to those restraints, and the obligation to observe in common with 

 the British the then existing local laws and regulations, which is imphed by 

 the words 'in common,' attached to the United States citizens as soon as they 

 claimed the benefit of the treaty.'' 



He then cites Mr. Marcy's circular as expressing that view, 

 the circular which related to laws which were in force at the time 

 the treaty of 1854 took effect. Then he says, on p. 686: 



"I have the honor to enclose a copy of an act passed by the Colonial 

 Legislature of Newfoundland, on the 27th March, 1862 . . . and a copy 

 of . . . the consolidated statutes of Newfoundland, passed in 1872." 



Then he says: 



"These regulations, which were in force at the date of the Treaty of Wash- 

 ington, were not abolished, but confirmed by the subsequent statutes, and 

 are binding under the treaty upon the citizens of the United States in common 

 with British subjects." 



He abandons the Sunday regulation passed in 1876 after the 

 treaty of 187 1 took effect, and which was really the only thing in 

 the minds of the Newfoundland fishermen, and plants himself 

 strictly upon the proposition, not that the United States was subject 

 to any subsequent legislation, but that the treaty made them subject 

 to regulations which existed at the time the treaty was made; and 

 in order to leave no doubt whatever of what he means and the 

 hmit and force of it, he proceeds in the last paragraph of his letter 

 on p. 687 to say: 



"Mr.- Evarts will not require to be assured that Her Majesty's Govern- 

 ment, while unable to admit the contention of the United States Government 

 on the present occasion, are fully sensible of the evils arising from any differ- 



