In by Canada, the President threatened in loose Minister in London, brought this along with. and general terms, that the authorities of the other objections against the Nova Scotia Act Republic would take steps to enforce what | of 1836, apparently in ignorance of the fact he called American rights. Whether in the that this provision did not originate with shape of an Imperial or Colonial enactment, the Legislature of that Province, but had first or both, the substance of the provision here been embodied in an Imperial Statute passed denounced had existed ever since the first the very next year after the treaty was conAct of Parliament was passed to give the cluded. No objection was then made that treaty effect; and this is the first time that the prohibiting of foreign vessels from prethe American Government made it the paring to fish within limits which they could ground of a like intimation. The President | enter only for other purposes, was beyond might fairly claim that, as the treaty was the scope of the treaty; and for nearly a made between the United States and Eng- quarter of a century, this provision was pracland, each country is entitled to look to the tically acquiesced in by the Americans. other for a fulfilment of its obligations. But all the long diplomatic controversies which is Canada no part of the British Empire? In grew out of these fisheries, we find no furpoint of fact, whatever seizures were made ther reference to this question till it found a were nearly all made by vessels belonging place in the list of grievances presented by to the British navy. British subjects living President Grant to Congress: good eviin this part of the Empire might surely act dence that he was making the most of his in conjunction with those sent by the metro- material. politan power to see the treaty obligations enforced. The fishery laws of the Dominion cannot go into effect till they receive the assent of the Crown, in one form or another. A question might be raised whether an error was not committed in the Act of 1867. This Act is in part, a literal copy of an Act passed by the Legislature of Nova Scotia, in 1836. Both these Acts authorized certain officers to board foreign fishing vessels, found in any harbour of Canada or hovering within three marine miles of any of the coasts, bays, creeks or harbours; and to take certain prescribed proceedings afterwards. There can be no doubt about the right to capture vessels fishing within three miles of any of the places mentioned; for the enactment, so far only follows the wording of the treaty. But whether a vessel preparing to fish would properly be liable to seizure and condemnation under the treaty, as it was under these Statutes, is a question that might fairly have been raised. But we do not find that it ever was raised till the Convention had been in force twenty-three years. In 1841, Mr. Forsyth, American That functionary also complained of the provision requiring a vessel found within a harbour to depart, on being warned to do so, within twenty-four hours. These foreign fishing vessels had a right to go into harbours to buy wood and obtain water; but they might be subjected to such restrictions as would be necessary to guard against their abusing this privilege. Was the requirement that a suspected vessel should leave within twentyfour hours a necessary restriction? In 1842, the English law officers of the Crown gave an opinion on the legality of another form of restriction. To the question, whether American fishermen had the right to enter the bays and harbours of Nova Scotia for the purpose of purchasing wood and obtaining water, when they had provided neither of these necessaries, in their own country, at the commencement of the voyage; or whether they had a right to do so only when their original supply of these articles had been exhausted: the answer was that the liberty of entering for these purposes was conceded in general terms, unrestricted by any conditions express or implied, and that none such as those suggested could be attached to its enjoyment. But this is quite consistent with the clearly expressed right to impose such restrictions as might be necessary to prevent any abuse of the liberty, whether by illegal trading, or catching or drying fish; and we do not think that, in case of a suspected vessel, having no further apparent reason to prolong her stay, the requirement that she should depart within twenty-four hours would be an act of undue rigour. But the provision is one that is liable to abuse, and requires the exercise of an equitable discrimination in its enforce ment. President Grant claimed for American fishing vessels a general right of trading in the ports of the Dominion; a claim, which, during the more than half century, which the Convention has been in force, was never advanced before. He seemed at a loss to know whether the denial of this right was based on the British construction of the treaty if it was, he could not acquiesce in it; if it was founded on Provincial Statutes, he felt at liberty to ignore them, all the dealings of the Republic, on this subject, being with England and not with Canada. The Canadian Statute to which exception is taken goes, on this point, neither beyond the Imperial Act of 1819, nor the Convention of 1818, both of which state, in so many words, that the fishermen of the United States may enter the harbours of certain specified portions of British America, "for the purpose of shelter, and repairing damages therein, of purchasing wood and obtain ing water, and for no other purpose whatever." The prohibition could hardly have been stronger, though it might have been expressed in more positive terms; it might, like the Treaty of 1798, between England and Spain, have engaged the party receiving the right of fishery, near the possessions of the other, to take measures to prevent this right being made a pretext for illicit traffic. All trade by one nation with the colonies of another was then illicit; and for this reason British subjects, in carrying on fisheries in the Pacific, were to keep ten marine leagues from the Spanish possessions. But When the Convention of 1818 was being negotiated, President Grant says, the American Commissioners opposed a proposal to render fishing vessels with goods on board liable to forfeiture, with their cargoes. Rush, one of the American negotiators, in his elaborate Memoranda, makes no such statement. And in any case, the Treaty must carry its own interpretation. It is plain from the language of the Convention, that a fishing vessel cannot engage in general trade; and it would be a suspicious circumstance if she were found with goods on board not required for the purposes of the voyage she was ostensibly prosecuting. she could be condemned only on proof that would satisfy the Admiralty Court that she was engaged in illegal trading. This question still possesses a living interest; for, far from being settled, it is in no way affected by the Treaty of Washington. Complaints of American fishing vessels engaging in smuggling are older than the Convention of 1818; but when we are asked to believe that the fifteen hundred of them which were employed in the Labrador fishery, in 1812, were smugglers of tea and coffee, it is impossible not to be convinced of exaggeration, since we cannot conceive where they found their customers. Owing to the much greater price of nearly all articles of consumption in the United States, than in Canada, the business of smuggling by fishing vessels must now be very limited. Goods could be much easier carried the other way; but as Canadian fishing vessels are not likely to avail themselves of the barren liberty of fishing in American waters, there is no danger of smuggling in that direction. When President Grant asked Congress to arm him with power to suspend the Bonding Act of 1846, and to interdict Canadian vessels from entering the ports of the Republic, as a means of retaliating assumed wrongs, in case they should be committed, we fear he did so for the purpose he attributed to the Dominion; to put pressure on this Government for political purposes. Whether that helped him or not, he has so far obtained his object as to have secured for the American fishermen, in a treaty requiring the indirect approval of the Parliament of the Dominion, the much coveted liberty of fishing along the Atlantic coasts of the whole of Canada, Prince Edward Island, and, if its Legislature assent, of Newfoundland. The extent of the compensation to be given to Canada for the cession of this liberty to the United States will not be known until the whole question is passed upon by a Commission of Arbitration. The British Commissioners asked, but failed to obtain, a renewal of the former Reciprocity Treaty; nor did the proposal, when modified so as to embrace the reciprocal throwing open of the coasting trade of each country to the inhabitants of the other, with the freedom of the navigation of the St. Lawrence to Americans, meet a better fate. A counter proposal from the American Commissioners contained an offer to purchase in perpetuity access to the shore fisheries; and a million of dollars was the price named. The British Commissioners refused to make any arrangement which did not include the admission, duty free, of the produce of the British fisheries into the markets of the United States; and they said a million of dollars was utterly inadequate as a compensation. And now came a most remarkable phase in the negotiations. The American Commissioners, after repeating their previous decision on a reciprocal tariff and the coasting trade, proposed that there be a free reciprocity in three articles, at once: coal, salt and fish, and, subject to the approval of Congress, lumber, after the first of July, 1874. This proposal was referred by the British Commissioners to their Government, and rejected as inadequate, with the suggestion that lumber should, as well as the three other products, be admitted free at once, and that these concessions should be supplemented by a money payment. The Americans then, instead of making an advance on their previous offer, withdrew it, saying that it was more than an adequate compensation for the fisheries, and that it had been made entirely in the interest of a peaceable settlement and with a view to removing a source of irritation and anxiety. They followed up this backward movement by repeating the proposal of a money payment for the fisheries; and adding that the amount, if the two Governments could not agree what it should be, should be determined by an impartial arbitration. The British Commissioners, besides adhering to their former proposal to secure a free market in the United States for the products of our fisheries, insisted that any arrangement come to should be limited to a term of years. This last proposal of the American Commissioners, with the limitation contended for by the British Commissioners, was agreed to. British subjects received, in addition, the nominal privilege of fishing-shell fish excepted in this as in the other case—on the eastern coasts of the United States, north of the thirty-ninth parallel of north latitude, along the adjacent islands, and the bays, harbours and creeks; with permission to land and dry their fish, subject to the rights of private property and without interfering with American fishermen. The terms of this agreement are reciprocal; Americans obtaining access to those of our shore, fisheries from which they were previously excluded, on precisely the same conditions. This is not the first time our fishermen were admitted to part of the American coast fisheries; but the only time at which this liberty would have been of any possible value, it was withheld. Critics, who commented adversely on the Treaty of 1783, by which the Americans received from England, besides an acknowledgment of their independence, the privilege of fishing on the coasts of British America, objected to this absence of reciprocity in an instrument the preamble of which declared "reciprocal advantages and mutual convenience" to be the only permanent foundations of peace and friendship between States. But the better opinion, even then, was that the Colonies lost nothing of real value by this variance between the professions of the preamble and the stipulations of the articles. When the question was subsequently mooted, the proposed concession was treated as of no practical value. The Treaty of 1854 gave the liberty of fishing on the American coast down to the 36th degree of latitude; but a matter of three degrees is of no consequence when there is no probability that any part of these waters will be used by British fishermen. A liberty of fishing in waters exhausted of fish long ago can be of no value to a people at whose doors lie the rich fisheries which had long been an ardent object of desire to Americans. There is one possible objection which the obtaining of this unprofitable concession may overcome; the objection to fleets of foreign vessels entering the private waters of our coasts, and penetrating far beyond the headlands towards the heart of the country. If this be an objection, on one side, it is balanced by a like concession on the other. The admission, duty free, of our fish and fish oil into the markets of the United States is a real advantage; though to measure its money value may be a difficult task for the Commissioners by whom it will have to be decided. It has always, except during the period of the Reciprocity Treaty, been a subject of complaint among Nova Scotia and New Brunswick fishermen that the products of their industry were burthened with high duties on their entrance into the United States. In 1845, the British Government But addressed a complaint to that of Washington, on this subject; and some reduction. was for a time made, as if, though not by stipulation or avowedly, in return for the concession of the liberty to Americans to fish in the Bay of Fundy. But whatever the value of the freedom of the United States market, assuredly it is not an equivalent for the liberty obtained by their fishermen of enjoying our shore fisheries on the same terms as our own people engage in them. them. It remains to ascertain the balance to be paid in money. The difficulty will be to appraise the concessions, on the one side and the other, and to strike a balance. That very difficulty would have prevented the Joint High Commission from deciding the point, though it would have been more satisfactory if a summary solution had been possible. It is true the same machinery— an arbitration-is to be used to determine the amount of the Alabama claims. the cases are not parallel. The moment England consented to pay these claims, some joint authority for examining and passing upon them became necessary, But the fisheries constituted a property possessed on the one side, and participation in which was desired on the other; and it would have been better, if it could have been managed, to determine definitely the terms on which the coveted concessions should be made. There is no objection to arbitration in itself: the objection is to selling for a price afterwards to be ascertained; introducing an element of uncertainty where certainty should prevail. But we have no right to conclude that the money balance will not be equitably determined. It is beyond doubt that, if Canada had had the right to initiate the arrangement, this way of dealing with the question would not have been taken; and the bargain that has been made will be accepted only in deference to Imperial wishes and in the interests of peace between two nations which could not go to war without making a battle-ground of the Dominion. Situated as Canada is, it can have no political connections which would not involve some sacrifices, on one side and on the other. In the absence of this fishery arrangement, unsatisfactory as it may be, all the old disputes that have arisen under the Convention of 1818 would revive; and, as we have seen, there is a constant tendency to add to the number, and an increased acrimony, at least on one side, in their discussion. Nothing is easier than to find a new interpretation of an old instrument; and the moment this is done the objection is raised that, acting in reliance of a meaning never before questioned, we have no right to capture offending vessels, since the difference is one to be settled by diplomacy. We may be thankful that we have got rid of this difficulty, though not on terms that we should have preferred. There is an apparent difference in the time for which the freedom of the navigation of the River St. Lawrence is granted to the Americans and that for which British subjects obtain a title to the navigation of Lake Michigan. The first is, in express terms, granted "forever;" the second for the period of ten years, during which the Treaty will be in force, and the additional two years, during which it would continue to exist after notice of its termination had been given. If no such notice were given, the time might be prolonged indefinitely; but this freedom of the navigation of Lake Michigan is liable to be terminated at the end of twelve years. Is this, then, so unequal a bargain as the difference between twelve years and forever? Can a Treaty, liable to be terminated, convey rights in perpetuity? The Treaty being the foundation of those rights, do they not fall with it? In case of the termination of this Treaty by war, would not the two parties to it be remitted to the positions they respectively held before the Treaty was made? There are cases of a precisely similar character, which seem to supply the answers to these ques tions. The Treaty of 1783 stipulated that the navigation of the Mississippi, from its sources to the ocean, should "forever remain open to the subjects of Great Britain and the citizens of the United States." After the war of 1812, the American diplomatists, at Ghent, refused to renew this article. When the Convention of 1818 was negotiated, this refusal was persisted in. The American negotators argued that since it had been discovered that the source of the Mississippi was not in British territory, there was no reason why British subjects should have the freedom of this river, The use of the word "forever" in a Treaty of which all those parts not obviously of a permanent nature-as were those which recognized the independence of the Republic-had been abrogated by war, counted for nothing. The difficulty under which the American negotiators insisted on their point may be imagined, when it is remembered that, for other reasons, they were driven to the necessity of arguing that the war had not vacated the Treaty. And even while depriving of all value the word "forever," as used in the Convention of 1783, they, with bold inconsistency, refused to have any other word to mark the duration of certain fishery concessions they were then obtaining. But in spite of the use of this word, Rush admits that England would hold, in case of war, that the Treaty had been abrogated. But if the difference between the effect of the words used in the cases of the navigation of the St. Lawrence and of Lake Michigan is only nominal, and if there be some possible conjunctures in which each party would revert to the position it respectively held before the treaty was concluded, we can conceive of no circumstances, in time of peace, which would render it desirable to attempt to exclude the Americans from the St. Lawrence. St. Lawrence. President Grant made it a subject of complaint that the Dominion claimed a right to deny to American citizens the freedom of this river. Something over |