CORRESPONDENCE 419 



ment, that, presumptively, regulations would be uniform in their operation upon the 

 subjects of both governments in similar case. If there are to be regulations of a 

 common enjoyment, they must be authenticated by a common or a joint authority. 



But, most manifestly, the subject of the regulation of the enjoyment of the shore 

 fishery by the resident provincial population, and of the inshore fishery by our fleet of 

 fishing-cruisers, does not tolerate the control of so divergent and competing interests 

 by the domestic legislation of the Province. Protecting and nursing the domestic inter- 

 est at the expense of the foreign interest, on the ordinary motives of human conduct, 

 necessarily shape and animate the local legislation. The evidence before the Halifax 

 Commission makes it obvious that, to exclude our fishermen from catching bait, and 

 thus compel them to go without bait, or buy bait at the will and price of the provincial 

 fishermen, is the interest of the local fishermen, and will be the guide and motive of 

 such domestic legislation as is now brought to the notice of this Government. 



You will therefore say to Lord Salisbury that this Government cannot but express 

 its entire dissent from the view of the subject that his lordship's note seems to indi- 

 cate. This Government conceives that the fishery rights of the United States, con- 

 ceded by the Treaty of Washington, are to be exercised wholly free from the restraints 

 and regulations of the Statutes of Newfoundland, now set up as authority over our 

 fishermen, and from any other regulations of fishing now in force or that may here- 

 after be enacted by that Government. 



It may be said that a just participation in this common fishery by tlie two parties 

 entitled thereto, may, in the common interest of preserving the fishery and preventing 

 conflicts between the fishermen, require regulation by some competent authority. 

 This may be conceded. But should such occasion present itself to the common 

 appreciation of the two Governments, it need not be said that such competent authority 

 can only be found in a joint convention, that shall receive the approval of Her 

 Majesty's Government and our own. Until this arrangement shall be consummated, 

 this Government must regard the pretension that the legislation of Newfoundland can 

 regulate our fishermen's enjoyment of the treaty right as striking at the treaty itself. 

 It asserts an authority on one side, and a submission on the other, which has not been 

 proposed to us by Her Majesty's Government, and has not been accepted by this 

 Government. I cannot doubt that Lord Salisbury will agree that the insertion of 

 any such element in the Treaty of Washington would never have been accepted by 

 this Government, if it could reasonably be thought possible that it could have been 

 proposed by Her Majesty's Government. The insertion of any such proposition by 

 construction now is equally at variance with the views of this Government. 



The representations made to this Government by the interests of our citizens 

 affected, leave no room to doubt that this assertion of authority is as serious and 

 extensive in practical relations as it is in principle. The rude application made to 

 the twenty vessels in Fortune Bay of this asserted authority, in January last, drove 

 them from the profitable prosecution of their projected cruises. By the same reason, 

 the entire inshore fishery is held by us upon the same tenure of dependence upon 

 the parliament of the Dominion or the legislatures of the several Provinces. 



I cannot but regret that this vital question has presented itself so unexpectedly 

 to this Government, and at a date so near the period at which this Government, upon 

 a comparison of views with Her Majesty's Government, is to pass upon the conformity 

 of the proceedings of the Halifax Commission with the requirements of the Treaty 

 of Washington. The present question is wholly aside from the considerations bearing 

 upon that subject, and which furnishes the topic of my recent dispatch. 



