Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Transmitted to Congress, With the Annual Message of the President, December 6, 1880
No. 376.
Mr. Lowell to Mr. Evarts.
London, October 28, 1880. (Received November 9.)
Sir: I have the honor to acquaint you that I received this morning from Lord Granville an important letter upon the subject of our claims for indemity growing out of the disturbance of our fishermen at Fortune Bay in January, 1878. I shall send by cable to-night an abstract of this letter, and I herewith transmit a copy of it.
I have, &c.,
Earl Granville to Mr. Lowell.
Sir: Her Majesty’s Government have carefully considered the correspondence which has taken place between their predecessors and the Government of the United States respecting the disturbance which occurred at Fortune Bay, on the 6th of January, 1878, and they have approached this subject with the most earnest desire to arrive at [Page 589] an amicable solution of the differences which have unfortunately arisen between the two governments on the construction of the provisions of the treaties which regulate the rights of the United States fishermen on the coast of Newfoundland.
In the first place, I desire that there should be no possibility of Misconception as to the views entertained by Her Majesty’s Government respecting the conduct of the Newfoundland fishermen in violently interfering with the United States fishermen, and destroying or damaging some of their nets. Her Majesty’s Government have no hesitation in admitting that this proceeding was quite indefensible, and is much to be regretted. No sense of injury to their rights, however well founded, could, under the circumstances, justify the British fishermen in taking the law into their own hands and committing acts of violence, but I will revert by and by to this feature in the case, and will now proceed to the important question raised in this controversy, whether, under the treaty of Washington, the United States fishermen are bound to observe the fishery regulations of Newfoundland in common with British subjects.
Without entering into any lengthy discussion on this point, I feel bound to state that in the opinion of Her Majesty’s Government the clause in the treaty of Washington which provides that the citizens of the United States shall be entitled, “in common with British subjects,” to fish in Newfoundland waters within the limits of British sovereignty, means that the American and British fishermen shall fish in these waters upon terms of equality, and not that there shall be an exemption of American fishermen from any reasonable regulations to which British fishermen are subject.
Her Majesty’s Government entirely concur in Mr. Marcy’s circular of the 28th of March, 1856. The principle therein laid down appears to them perfectly sound, and as applicable to the fishery provisions of the treaty of Washington as those of the treaty which Mr. Marcy had in view. They cannot, therefore, admit the accuracy of the opinion expressed in Mr. Evarts’s letter to Mr. Welsh, of the 28th of September, 1878, “that the fishery rights of the United States conceded by the treaty of Washington are to be exercised wholly free from the restraints and regulations of the statutes of Newfoundland,” if by that opinion anything inconsistent with Mr. Marcys principle is really intended. Her Majesty’s Government, however, fully admit that if any such local statutes could be shown to be inconsistent with the express stipulations, or even with the spirit of the treaty, they would not be within the category of those reasonable regulations by which American (in common with British) fishermen ought to be bound, and they observe, on the other hand, with much satisfaction, that Mr. Evarts, at the close of his letter to Mr. Welsh, of the 1st of August, 1879, after expressing regret at “the conflict of interests which the exercise of the treaty privileges enjoyed by the United States appears to have developed,” expressed himself as follows:
“There is no intention on the part of this [the United States] government that these privileges should be abused, and no desire that their full and free enjoyment should harm the colonial fishermen.
“While the differing interests and methods of the shore fishery and the vessel fishery make it impossible that the regulation of the one should be entirely given to the other, yet if the mutual obligations of the treaty of 1871 are to be maintained, the United States Government would gladly co-operate with the Government of Her Britannic Majesty in any effort to make those regulations a matter of reciprocal convenience and right, a means of preserving the fisheries at their highest point of production, and of conciliating a community of interest by a just proportion of advantages and profits.”
Her Majesty’s Government do not interpret these expressions in any sense derogatory to the sovereign authority of Great Britain in the territorial waters of Newfoundland, by which only regulations having the force of law wdthin those waters can be made. So regarding the proposal, they are pleased not only to recognize in it an indication that the desire of Her Majesty’s Government to arrive at a friendly and speedy settlement of this question is fully reciprocated by the Government of the United States, but also to discern in it the basis of a practical settlement of the difficulty, and I have the honor to request that you will inform Mr. Evarts that Her Majesty’s Government, with a view to avoiding further discussion and future misunderstandings, are quite willing to confer with the Government of the United States respecting the establishment of regulations under which the subjects of both parties to the treaty of Washington shall have the full and equal enjoyment of any fishery which, under that treaty, is to be used in common. The duty of enacting and enforcing such regulations, when agreed upon, would of course rest with the power having the sovereignty of the shore and waters in each case.
As regards the claim of the United States fishermen to compensation for the injuries and losses which they are alleged to have sustained in consequence of the violent obstruction which they encountered from British fishermen at Fortune Bay on the occasion referred to, I have to state that Her Majesty’s Government are quite willing that they should be indemnified for any injuries and losses which, upon a joint inquiry, may be found to have been sustained by them, and in respect of which they are reasonably entitled to compensation; but on this point I have, to observe that a claim is put forward [Page 590] by them for the loss of fish which had been caught, or which, but for the interference of the British fishermen, might have been caught by means of strand fishing, a mode of fishing to which, under the treaty of Washington, they were not entitled to resort.
The prosecution by them of the strand fishery being clearly in excess of their treaty privileges, Her Majesty’s Government cannot doubt that, on further consideration, the United States Government will not be disposed to support a claim in respect of the loss of the fish which they had caught or might have caught by that process.
I have, &c.,