AWARD OF THE TRIBUNAL 511 



6°. It has been contended by the United States that the words "coasts, bays, creeks 

 or harbours" are here used only to express different parts of the coast and are intended 

 to express and be equivalent to the word "coast," whereby the three marine miles 

 would be measured from the sinuosities of the coast and the renunciation would apply 

 only to the waters of bays within three miles. 



But the Tribunal is unable to agree with this contention: 



(a) Because it is a principle of interpretation that words in a document ought not 

 to be considered as being without any meaning if there is not specific evidence to that 

 purpose and the interpretation referred to would lead to the corisequence, practically, 

 of reading the words "bays, coasts and harbours" out of the Treaty; so that it would 

 read "within three miles of any of the coasts" including therein the coasts of the 

 bays and harbours; 



(6) Because the word therein" in the proviso — ''restrictions necessary to prevent 

 their taking, drying or curing fish therein" can refer only to "bays," and not to the 

 belt of three miles along the coast; and can be explained only on the supposition that 

 the words "bays, creeks and harbours" are to be understood in their usual ordinary 

 sense and not in an artificially restricted sense of bays within the three mile belt; 



(c) Because the practical distinction for the purpose of this fishery between coasts 

 and bays and the exceptional conditions pertaining to the latter has been shown from 

 the correspondence and the documents in evidence, especially the Treaty of 1783, to 

 have been in all probability present to the minds ot the negotiators of the Treaty of 

 1818; 



(d) Because the existence of this distinction is confirmed in the same article of the 

 Treaty by the proviso permitting the United States fishermen to enter bays for certain 

 purposes; 



(e) Because the word "coasts" is used m the plural form whereas the contention 

 would require its use in the singular; 



(/) Because the Tribunal is unable to understand the term "bays" in the renuncia- 

 tory clause in other than its geographical sense, by which a bay is to be considered as 

 an indentation of the coast, bearing a configuration of a particular character easy to 

 determine specifically, but difficult to describe generally. 



The negotiators of the Treaty of 1818 did probably not trouble themselves with 

 subtle theories concerning the notion of "bays"; they most probably thought that 

 everybody would know what was a bay. In this popular sense the term must be in- 

 terpreted in the Treaty. The interpretation must take into account all the individual 

 circumstances which for any one of the different bays are to be appreciated, the relation 

 of its width to the length of penetration inland, the possibility and the necessity of its 

 being defended by the State in whose territory it is indented; the special value which 

 it has for the industry of the inhabitants of its shores; the distance which it is secluded 

 from the highways of nations on the open sea and other circumstances not possible 

 to enumerate in general. 



For these reasons the Tribunal decides and awards: 



In case of bays the three marine miles are to be measured from a straight line drawn 

 across the body of water at the place where it ceases to have the configuration 

 and characteristics of a bay. At all other places the three marine miles are to 

 be measured following the sinuosities of the coast. 



But considering the Tribunal cannot overlook that this answer to Question V, 

 although correct in principle and the only one possible in view of the want of a sufficient 

 basis for a more concrete answer, is not entirely satisfactory as to its practical 



