452 APPENDIX 



to issue Kcenses, directing that the failure or refusal to produce a license should be 

 prima, facie evidence of the purchase of such articles without a license. The position 

 of any American fishing-vessel choosing to fish for herself on the Treaty ■Coast has 

 consequently been since 1893 the same as it is to-day. His Majesty's Government 

 do not advance these considerations with the object of suggesting that the objections 

 which the United States' Government have taken to sections i and 3 of the Foreign 

 Fishing- Vessels Act are impaired by the fact that these provisions have been on the 

 Statute Book of the Colony since 1893 without protest, and they are ready to assume 

 that no such protest has been lodged merely because the privileges accorded to Ameri- 

 can vessels in the ports of the Colony up to the present have been such as to render it 

 unnecessary for inhabitants of the United States to avail themselves of their right of 

 fishing under the Convention of 1818. The object of His Majesty's Government is 

 simply to remove any impression which may have formed itself in the mind of the 

 United States' Government that the language of the Act of 1905 was selected with 

 any special view of prejudicing the exercise of the American Treaty right of fishery, 

 and to point out that, on the contrary, it dates back to 1893, that is, to a time when it 

 was the policy of the Colonial Government to treat American vessels on a favored 

 footing. 



A new Act was not necessary to give effect to the present policy of the Colonial 

 Government. Effect to it could have been given under the Act of 1893 by the mere 

 suspension of the issue of licenses to American vessels, and the only object of the new 

 Act, as His Majesty's Government understand the position, was to secure the express 

 and formal approval of the Colonial Legislature for the carrying out of the policy of 

 the Colonial Government. 



Having offered these general remarks, His Majesty's Government desire to point 

 out that, in discussing the' general eiiects of "The Foreign Fishing- Vessels Act, 1905," 

 on the American fishery under the Convenrion of 1818, the United States' Government 

 confine themselves to sections i and 3 and make no reference to section 7, which 

 preserves "the rights and privileges granted by Treaty to the subjects of any State 

 in amity with His Majesty." In view of this provision. His Majesty's Government 

 are imable to agree with the United States' Government in regarding the provisions of 

 sections i and 3 as "constituting a warrant to the officers named to interfere with and 

 violate" American rights under the Convention of 1818. On the contrary, they con- 

 sider section 7 as, in effect, a prohibition of any vexatious interference with the exer- 

 cise of the Treaty rights whether of American or of French fishermen. As regards 

 section 3, they admit that the possession by inhabitants of the United States of any 

 fish and gear which they may lawfully take or use in the exercise of their rights under 

 the Convention of 18 18 cannot properly be made primd facie evidence of the commis- 

 sion of an offense, and, bearing in mind the provisions of section 7, they cannot beUeve 

 that a Court of Law would take a different view. 



They do not, however, contend that the Act is as clear and explicit as, in the cir- 

 cumstances, it is desirable that it should be, and they propose to confer with the Govern- 

 ment of Newfoundland with the object of removing any doubts which the Act in its 

 present form may suggest as to the power of His Majesty to fulfil his obligations 

 under the Convention of 1818. 



On the concluding part of Mr. Root's note it is happily not necessary for His 

 Majesty's Government to oiier any remarks, since the fishing season has come to an 

 end without any attempt on the part of British fishermen to interfere with the peace- 

 ful exercise of the American Treaty right of fishery. 



