ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 273 



Senator Root: I do not think any more natural than this. 

 I think it is merely a matter of style. It would have involved the 

 use of one more word. 



Sir Charles Fitzpatrick: Style and meaning. 



Senator Root: I cannot see that there would be any difference 

 in the meaning. 



"The .United States Tiereby renounce, forever, any liberty heretofore 

 enjoyed or claimed by the inhabitants thereof to take, dry, or cure fish on 

 the coasts, bays, creeks, or harbors of His Britannic Majesty's dominions 

 in America, or within three marine miles thereof" 



would be the President's suggestion. That is a very good way to 

 express it, but I think it is merely a question of style as to whether 

 you make an additional clause or incorporate the words in the same 

 line. 



The President: It would certainly express your idea in a 

 clearer way, I should think. 



Senator Root: That would probably result from the fact that 

 the style of the President of the Tribunal is superior. 



The President: I make no pretensions at all as to style. 



Senator Root: Whatever inference is to be drawn here, there 

 is no dispute — and I take it there can be none — that the bays, 

 harbors, and creeks referred to were within the territorial Kmits of 

 Great Britain, and were not something additional to those territorial 

 limits. As I said a few minutes ago, in answer to a question, if we 

 can ascertain what those territorial limits are, we have an infallible 

 guide to show us what bays, harbors, and creeks were referred to. 



The first proposition which I wish to make in the effort to ascer- 

 tain what the negotiators understood these limits to be, for, after 

 all, that is the great question — we are not so much concerned about 

 what some arguments might have established them to be as with 

 what the makers of the treaty considered them to be — is that there 

 is now, there was then, and there always has been, ever since the 

 old vague claims to great areas of the sea were dispelled and aban- 

 doned, a rule, which is a rule of common sense, almost of necessity, 



