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capes of the Delaware, and from the south Cape of Florida to the Mississippi." While Chesapeake and Delaware Bays and other inlets of a like character are still considered as territorial waters, the general policy of this Government, conforming itself to the opinion of the civilised world, clearly tends towards the curtailment of any unreasonable claim to jurisdiction outside of the marine league.

ENGLISH WRITERS.

The English authorities are in agreement with this view.

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Maritime territorial rights extend as a general rule over arms of the sea, bays, gulfs, estuaries, which are enclosed but not entirely surrounded by lands belonging to one and the same State. He disputes the proposition that the extent of sovereignty over bays is subject to any definite limitation, and cites in support of his view the argument of Mr. Dana, Counsel for the United States, delivered before the Halifax Fishery Commission in 1877. Mr. Dana contended that there was no agreement among jurists as to the bays which might be treated as territorial waters. He said (App., p. 266) :

The difficulties on that subject are inherent, and to my mind they are insuperable.

CONCEPTION BAY CASE.

In the case decided by the Privy Council, to which reference has already been made, Lord Blackburn, in giving the reasons of the Committee, deals with the opinions of jurists on this point in the following terms:

Passing from the common law of England to the general law of nations, as indicated by the text writers on international jurisprudence, we find an universal agreement that harbours, estuaries, and bays landlocked belonged to the territory of the nation which possesses the shores round them, but no agreement as to what is the rule to determine what is "bay " for this purpose.

It seems generally agreed that where the configuration and dimensions of the bay are such as to show that the nation occupying the adjoining coasts also occupies the bay it is part of the territory; and with this idea most of the writers on the subject refer to defensibility from the shore as the test of occupation; some suggesting therefore a width of one cannon-shot from shore to shore, or 3 miles; some a cannon-shot from each shore, or 6 miles; some an arbitrary distance of 10 miles. All of these are rules which, if adopted, would exclude Conception Bay from the territory of New

a International Law (3rd ed), vol. i, p. 284. Halifax Commission, 1877, pp. 1663, 1664.

Direct U. S. Cable Co. and Anglo-Am. Tel. Co., 1877, L. R., 2 A. C., pp. 419, 420.

foundland, but also would have excluded from the territory of Great Britain that part of the Bristol Channel which in Reg. v. Cunninghama was decided to be in the county of Glamorgan. On the other hand, the diplomatists of the United States in 1793 claimed a territorial jurisdiction over much more extensive bays, and Chancellor Kent, in his Commentaries, though by no means giving the weight of his authority to this claim, gives some reasons for not considering it altogether unreasonable.

119 It does not appear to their Lordships that jurists and text writers are agreed what are the rules as to dimensions and configuration, which, apart from other considerations, would lead to the conclusion that a bay is or is not a part of the territory of the State possessing the adjoining coasts; and it has never, that they can find, been made the ground of any judicial determination.

Hall' treats bays as subject to very different considerations from those which apply to the open sea. He points out that nations have continually asserted claims to sovereignty over bays; and, after examining the principles on which occupation of these tracts of water may be justified, comes to the conclusion that a State may claim exclusive rights over waters which are supposed to be necessary to the safety of the State or which are within its powers to command.

EARLIER CONTINENTAL WRITERS.

These views are founded on the opinions of earlier continental writers. Thus Puffendorf says:

Gulfs and channels or arms of the sea are, according to the regular course, supposed to belong to the people with whose lands they are encompassed.

Azuni, writing in 1796, says:

It is already established among polished nations that, in places where the land, by its curve, forms a bay or a gulf, we must suppose a line to be drawn from one point of the enclosing land to the other, or along the small islands which extend beyond the headlands of the bay, and that the whole of this bay, or gulf, is to be considered as territorial sea, even though the centre may be, in some places, at a greater distance than 3 miles from either shore.

Bluntschli recognises that bays cannot be subject to the same limitations as the belt of sea along the coast, and admits that other considerations admit and justify a larger dominion.

Vattel says:—

Tout ce que nous avons dit des parties de la mer voisines des côtes se dit plus particulièrement et à plus forte raison des rades, des baies,

a Bell's Cr. C., p. 72.

5th Ed., p. 155.

c Law of Nature and Nations, B. iv, c. v., s. 8, Kennet's ed., p. 382; and as quoted by Twiss (1884), p. 294.

& Maritime Law of Europe, New York, 1806, vol. i, p. 206.

e S. 309.

↑ 1830, s. 291, p. 272.

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et des détroits, comme plus capables encore d'être occupés, et plus importants à la sûreté du pays. Mais je parle des baies et détroits de peu d'étendue, et non de ces grands espaces de mer auxquels on donne quelquefois ces noms, tels que la baie de Hudson, le Détroit de Magellan, sur lesquels l'empire ne saurait s'étendre, et moins encore la propriété. Une baie dont on peut défendre l'entrée peut être occupée et soumise aux lois du Souverain; il importe qu'elle le soit, puisque le pays pourrait être beaucoup plus aisément insulté en cet endroit que sur des côtes ouvertes aux vents et à l'impétuosité des flots.

Hautefeuille says:

Les côtes de la mer ne présentent pas une ligne droite et régulière; elles sont, au contraire, presque toujours coupées de baies, de caps, &c.; si le domaine maritime devait, toujours, être mesuré de chacun des points du rivage, il en résulterait de graves inconvénients. Aussi est-on convenu, dans l'usage, de tirer une ligne fictive d'un promontoire à l'autre, et de prendre cette ligne pour point de départ de la portée du canon. Ce mode, adopté par presque tous les peuples, ne s'applique qu'aux petites baies, et non aux golfes d'une grande étendue, comme le Golfe de Gascogne, comme celui de Lyon, qui sont en réalité de grandes parties de mer complétement ouvertes, et dont il est impossible de nier l'assimilation complète avec la haute

mer.

PRESENT OPINIONS-INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW.

The opinions of present jurists may be best ascertained from the conclusions of the Institute of International Law. The subject was exhaustively discussed at the session at Paris in 1899, the exceptionally large number of thirty-nine members being present. They agreed to propose the following rule:

Art. 3. Pour les baies, la mer territoriale suit les sinuosités de la côte, sauf qu'elle est mesurée à partir d'une ligne droite tirée en travers de la baie dans la partie la plus rapprochée de l'ouverture vers la mer, où l'écart entre les deux côtes de la baie est de 12 milles marins de largeur, à moins qu'un usage continu et séculaire n'ait consacré une largeur plus grande.

The object of the reservation at the end of this article is explained by the learned reporter, M. Barclay, in these words:Les baies ne servent pas, en général, à la navigation entre pays autres que le pays riverain. Elles sont placées par les promontoires en dehors des routes de la haute mer, séparées d'elle par une marque nettement déterminée. Or il y a beaucoup de baies qui ont bien plus de 10 milles et même 16 milles d'écart, et qui, par leur situation, sont nécessairement placées sous la souveraineté absolue de l'État riverain. Il en est ainsi pour les firths écossais. Pour la Baie de Cancale, la distance est de 17 milles; pour celle de

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"Droits et Devoirs des Nations neutres," 1858, vol. i, p. 92.

“Annuaire de l'Institut de Droit international," tome 13, 1894, 1895, p. 329. P. 147.

Chaleur, au Canada, de 16 milles. Toutes ces baies sont considérées comme étant sous la domination exclusive de l'État riverain. Il y a lieu, enfin, de consacrer le principe que la baie est dans une situation différente de la mer territoriale proprement dite.

It is clear from the report of M. Barclay that in his opinion (1) there is no rule in international law as to the extent of bays of the nature now suggested by the United States, and (2) the considerations applicable to the belt of territorial sea do not apply to bays.

OTHER OPINIONS.

Attempts have been made, it is true, by some writers to suggest a general principle capable of application to all enclosed waters. But these suggestions have led to no practical result. The difference in the considerations which affect particular cases has made it difficult, if not impossible, to formulate any general rule; and the difference in the considerations which affect the open sea on the one hand, and enclosed waters on the other hand, has made it impossible to apply the same general rule to both.

SUMMARY.

It is submitted therefore that the opinions of jurists establish that there is not any definite limit, whether 6 miles or more, beyond which enclosed waters such as bays may not be claimed as territorial waters by the State within whose shores they are enclosed; and that a fortiori there was no such limit in 1818. It follows that the word "bay as used in the treaty was used in its ordinary sense and included all those tracts of water known at the time as bays.

NEGOTIATIONS OF 1818.

In addition to these arguments, His Majesty's Government desire to point out to the Tribunal that the circumstances existing at the time of the negotiations of 1818 themselves negative the contention that the term "bays of His Britannic Majesty's dominions" as used in the treaty was not intended to include the whole of the bays on the British coasts.

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At the beginning of the last century, Great Britain and the United States were putting forward wide claims to jurisdiction over territorial waters, as has already been shown. The case of Delaware Bay and the claims of the United States were fresh in the minds of the American negotiators; the rights of Great Britain over the waters surrounding the British coasts had been the subject of still more recent discussion. In view of these facts it is impossible to believe that the negotiations of 1818 were conducted on the footing that bays more than 6 miles wide were necessarily part of

the high seas. If it had been intended to limit the meaning of the word "bay" to bays of a certain size only, that limitation would certainly have been discussed and, if agreed to, would have been expressed on the face of the treaty.

The limit of sovereignty over enclosed waters contended for by the United States has never yet been recognized by the Law of Nations, and this Tribunal, as is respectfully submitted, can only act upon principles which have already become part of the law which it is administering.

CONCLUSION.

Great Britain, therefore, contends that the treaty applies to all bays on the coasts of British North America, and that the three marine miles specified in article one must be measured, in the case of unindented coasts, from the shore line at low tide; and, in the case of all bays, creeks, or harbours, from a line drawn across the mouths of such bays, creeks, or harbours.

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