The Alaskan Boundary Tribunal 



7 



tention was that the crests of the 

 mountains nearest to the sea should be 

 taken as the boundary line. The Can- 

 adian experts claimed to have estab- 

 lished a series of peaks or mountain 

 chains sufficiently parallel to the coast 

 to meet the requirements of the treaty. 

 In conformity with this theory a bound- 

 ary line delineated on the map was put 

 forward, which rarely diverged more 

 than five miles from the sea and often 

 was less than a mile therefrom, which 

 cut across the heads of all the inlets, 

 divided the ' ' coast strip ' ' or lisierc of 

 the treaty into sixteen disconnected sec- 

 tions of territory, and transferred to 

 Canada towns, settlements, industrial 

 establishments, and mines which had 

 been in undisputed possession of Amer- 

 icans for many }'ears. 



The Tribunal decided that, under the 

 treaty, the United States was entitled to 

 a continuous strip of territory which 

 extended around the heads of all the 

 inlets, thus excluding all contact of 

 British territory with the sea from Port- 

 land Canal north to Mt St Elias. It 

 also fixed the eastern or interior bound- 

 ary line at designated mountain peaks 

 to conform to this decision. While this 

 interior line did not extend ten leagues 

 from the ocean (the distance put forward 

 in the case of the United States) , it was 

 a substantial acceptance of the most 

 material claim of this country, and the 

 result has been so regarded on both 

 sides. 



Much time was consumed and learned 

 argument applied to the meaning of the 

 terms of the treaty, ' ' the crest of the 

 mountains, ' ' the ' ' ocean, ' ' the ' ' coast, ' ' 

 "sinuosities of the coast," etc., which 

 can not be followed in the time at my 

 command, but the foregoing is, I trust, 

 a sufficient exposition to enable those 

 not already informed to understand the 

 two principal points at issue and how 

 they were settled. 



I turn now to a consideration of the 

 composition, the preliminary work, and 



the proceedings of the Tribunal. It has 

 already been stated that it was made up 

 of three members appointed by each 

 government. The treaty creating the 

 Tribunal required that its members 

 should be " impartial jurists of repute, 

 who shall consider judicially the ques- 

 tions submitted to them, each of whom 

 shall first subscribe an oath that he will 

 impartially consider the arguments and 

 evidence presented to the Tribunal and 

 will decide thereupon according to his 

 true judgment." 



The President nominated on his part 

 Elihu Root, of New York, Secretary of 

 War; Henry Cabot Lodge, Senator of 

 the United States from Massachusetts, 

 and George Turner, late Senator of the 

 United States from the State of Wash- 

 ington. Since the dissolution of the 

 Tribunal it has been disclosed that the 

 Canadian Government complained to the 

 British Colonial Office that the members 

 nominated by the President of the 

 United States were not such persons as 

 were contemplated by the treaty, to 

 wit, " impartial jurists of repute ; " but 

 it does not appear that the British Gov- 

 ernment regarded this complaint of 

 such a serious character as to bring it 

 to the attention of the President. It 

 was alleged that one of the American 

 members had expressed himself pub- 

 licly, sometime previous to his appoint- 

 ment, as strongly convinced of the jus- 

 tice of the claim of his government. It 

 was also objected that no one of the 

 three was taken from judicial life, and 

 that they all might be considered as 

 political rather than legal representa- 

 tives of their country. 



Whatever appropriateness there may 

 have been in the objections urged by 

 Canada, the sequel showed that the 

 selection of the President was entirely 

 fitting. It would be difficult to name 

 three men in the United States with 

 greater experience in and knowledge of 

 public affairs, with better trained minds 

 for the work they had to do, and who 



