ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 287 



greatest; then the old basis of the doctrine of King's Chambers 

 became of little consequence compared -with the doctrine of freedom 

 upon all other coasts. The importance of that principle of the 

 widest possible extent of freedom, for naval operations, developed by 

 these compelUng causes to which I have referred, marks the differ- 

 ence between the Jay Treaty of 1794 and this treaty of 1806. In 

 1794 — the head of Louis XVI had just fallen by the guillotine in the 

 preceding year — a disorderly and tumultuous strife was going on 

 in which all Europe was against repubhcan and commimistic France. 

 No powers were tested and no dangers were apprehended. While 

 in 1806 the great genius Napoleon had taken control and was 

 frightening the world, and Great Britain reahzed that she must 

 fight for her life and for civilization, the position she assumed then 

 I say she never departed from. 



It is very interesting to observe that Great Britain never has 

 made any general claim to sovereignty over the bays that indent 

 her dominions since the passing away of her old, wide, vague claims. 

 The treaty of 1839 with France is an exclusion of such claims. 

 That adopted the 3-mile limit, and it adopted a hne of maritime 

 jurisdiction at a point where a bay becomes 10 miles ydde. What 

 became of aU the rest? That shows that in 1839 Great Britain 

 was not asserting any general jurisdiction over chambers between 

 headlands, bays indenting her territory, merely because they were 

 between headlands, and merely because they indented her territory; 

 but that, as to all the generality of bays, she was wilKng to fix the 

 limit of her maritime jurisdiction at the point where they became 

 10 miles wide. The North Sea Treaty of 1882 shows, upon a wider 

 scale, the same disposition. 



It is a most interesting fact that nowhere in the long discussions 

 which have occurred between Great Britain and the United States 

 regarding the right of Great Britain to exclude American fishermen 

 from these great bays — nowhere, at no time, has Great Britain 

 ever planted herself upon the proposition that those bays were 

 territorial waters of Great Britain. I confess to some surprise 

 when an examination of this correspondence for the purpose of 

 ascertaining whether that was, or was not, so revealed to me the 

 fact that Great Britain had never planted herself upon that position. 

 She has always stood narrowly upon the construction of the renun- 



