ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 295 



of water; but it brings out in clearer relief the general poKcy, not 

 to regard these indentations as coming within maritime jurisdiction, 

 unless a specific cause is given, and a specific claim made. 



Such was the claim made by the United States over Delaware 

 Bay. It, at the instance of Great Britain, and against France, 

 asserted reasons why the principle of protection made it just and 

 necessary that in that particular place the United States should 

 exercise jurisdiction. It did not apply to bays generally, and so, 

 when the agreement was made upon the s-mile hmit, measured 

 from the shore, as the hmit of maritime jurisdiction, it was quite 

 consistent with the claim to Delaware Bay, and was an expression 

 of the same pohcy of Great Britain, thus authoritatively stated 

 by Lord Fitzmaurice in the House of Lords. 



And, while I have stated as an inference from general knowledge 

 of the condition of the times and the history of Great Britain that 

 there was a reason in British policy for the adoption and the main- 

 tenance of this unvarying course of conduct, I find very powerful 

 support for it in an observation of Lord Lansdowne in this same 

 debate, p. 225 of this same pamphlet of November nth, 1907. 



Lord Lansdowne, whom you will recall as the honored and 

 highly respected Minister of Foreign Affairs under the last adminis- 

 tration of Great Britain, a colleague of our friend Sir Robert Finlay 

 in the Cabinet of which Mr. Balfour was Premier, says: 



"From whatever authority they proceed, I am bound to point out that 

 it is not always very easy to determine where the open sea ends and territorial 

 waters begin; and anyone who has had anything to do with these questions 

 knows that there have been interminable negotiations upon the subject of 

 the right of fishing within bays in different parts of the world, and that if 

 you open the question as between this country and foreign countries in regard 

 to a particular bay in which we are interested, they will desire to have it opened 

 m regard to other bays and enclosed waters in other parts of the world." 



There is the key to the position of Great Britain. That is why 

 she did not make a general claim. She could not make a general 

 claim without laying it open to all of the countries, all over the 

 world, to make similar claims, and the great poHcy of the Empire 

 overbore and put aside what might have been the particular inter- 

 est of this comparatively small part of the British Empire. The 

 greater interest controlled. 



