Mr. Blaine to Sir Julian Pauncefote.
Washington, January 22, 1890.
Sir: Several weeks have elapsed since I had the honor to receive through the hands of Mr. Edwardes copies of two dispatches from Lord Salisbury complaining of the course of the United States revenue cutter Rush in intercepting Canadian vessels sailing under the British flag and engaged in taking fur seals in the waters of the Behring Sea.
Subjects which could not be postponed have engaged the attention of this Department and have rendered it impossible to give a formal answer to Lord Salisbury until the present time.
In the opinion of the President, the Canadian vessels arrested and detained in the Behring Sea were engaged in a pursuit that was in itself contra bonos mores, a pursuit which of necessity involves a serious and permanent injury to the rights of the Government and people of the United States. To establish this ground it is not necessary to argue the question of the extent and nature of the sovereignty of this Government over the waters of the Behring Sea; it is not necessary to explain, certainly not to define, the powers and privileges ceded by His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Russia in the treaty by which the Alaskan territory was transferred to the United States. The weighty considerations growing out of the acquisition of that territory, with all the rights on land and sea inseparably connected therewith, may be safely left out of view, while the grounds are set forth upon whish this Government [Page 367] rests its justification for the action complained of by Her Majesty’s Government.
It can not be unknown to Her Majesty’s Government that one of the most valuable sources of revenue from the Alaskan possessions is the fur-seal fisheries of the Behring Sea. Those fisheries had been exclusively controlled by the Government of Russia, without interference or without question, from their original discovery until the cession of Alaska to the United States in 1867. From 1867 to 1886 the possession in which Russia had been undisturbed was enjoyed by this Government also. There was no interruption and no intrusion from any source. Vessels from other nations passing from time to time through Behring Sea to the Arctic Ocean in pursuit of whales had always abstained from taking part in the capture of seals.
This uniform avoidance of all attempts to take fur seal in those waters had been a constant recognition of the right held and exercised first by Russia and subsequently by this Government. It has also been the recognition of a fact now held beyond denial or doubt that the taking of seals in the open sea rapidly leads to their extinction. This is not only the well-known opinion of experts, both British and American, based upon prolonged observation and investigation, but the fact had also been demonstrated in a wide sense by the well-nigh total destruction of all seal fisheries except the one in the Behring Sea, which the Government of the United States is now striving to preserve, not altogether for the use of the American people, but for the use of the world at large.
The killing of seals in the open sea involves the destruction of the female in common with the male. The slaughter of the female seal is reckoned as an immediate loss of three seals, besides the future loss of the whole number which the bearing seal may produce in the successive years of life. The destruction which results from killing seals in the open sea proceeds, therefore, by a ratio which constantly and rapidly increases, and insures the total extermination of the species within a very brief period. It has thus become known that the only proper time for the slaughter of seals is at the season when they betake themselves to the land, because the land is the only place where the necessary discrimination can be made as to the age and sex of the seal. It would seem, then, by fair reasoning, that nations not possessing the territory upon which seals can increase their numbers by natural growth, and thus afford an annual supply of skins for the use of mankind, should refrain from the slaughter in open sea, where the destruction of the species is sure and swift.
After the acquisition of Alaska the Government of the United States, through competent agents working under the direction of the best experts, gave careful attention to the improvement of the seal fisheries. Proceeding by a close obedience to the laws of nature, and rigidly limiting the number to be annually slaughtered, the Government succeeded in increasing the total number of seals and adding correspondingly and largely to the value of the fisheries. In the course of a few years of intelligent and interesting experiment the number that could be safely slaughtered was fixed at 100,000 annually. The company to which the administration of the fisheries was intrusted by a lease from this Government has paid a rental of $50,000 per annum, and in addition thereto $2.62½ per skin for the total number taken. The skins were regularly transported to London to be dressed and prepared for the markets of the world, and the business had grown so large that the earnings of [Page 368] English laborers, since Alaska was transferred to the United States, amount in the aggregate to more than twelve millions of dollars.
The entire business was then conducted peacefully, lawfully, and profitably—profitably to the United States, for the rental was yielding a moderate interest on the large sum which this Government had paid for Alaska, including the rights now at issue profitably to the Alaskan Company, which, under governmental direction and restriction, had given unwearied pains to the care and development of the fisheries; profitably to the Aleuts, who were receiving a fair pecuniary reward for their labors, and were elevated from semi-savagery to civilization and to the enjoyment of schools and churches provided for their benefit by the Government of the United States; and, last of all, profitably to a large body of English laborers who had constant employment and received good wages.
This, in brief, was the condition of the Alaska fur-seal fisheries down to the year 1886. The precedents, customs, and rights had been established and enjoyed, either by Russia or the United States, for nearly a century. The two nations were the only powers that owned a foot of land on the continents that bordered, or on the islands, included within, the Behring waters where the seals resort to breed. Into this peaceful and secluded field of labor, whose benefits were so equitably shared by the native Aleuts of the Pribylov Islands, by the United States, and by England, certain Canadian vessels in 1886 asserted their right to enter, and by their ruthless course to destroy the fisheries and with them to destroy also the resulting industries which are so valuable. The Government of the United States at once proceeded to check this movement, which, unchecked, was sure to do great and irreparable harm.
It was cause of unfeigned surprise to the United States that Her Majesty’s Government should immediately interfere to defend and encourage (surely to encourage by defending) the course of the Canadians in disturbing an industry which had been carefully developed for more than ninety years under the flags of Russia and the United States—developed in such manner as not to interfere with the public rights or the private industries of any other people or any other person.
Whence did the ships of Canada derive the right to do in 1886 that which they had refrained from doing for more than ninety years? Upon what grounds did Her Majesty’s Government defend in the year 1886 a course of conduct in the Behring Sea which she had carefully avoided ever since the discovery of that sea? By what reasoning did Her Majesty’s Government conclude that an act may be committed with impunity against the rights of the United States which had never been attempted against the same rights when held by the Russian Empire?
So great has been the injury to the fisheries from the irregular and destructive slaughter of seals in the open waters of the Behring Sea by Canadian vessels, that whereas the Government had allowed one hundred thousand to be taken annually for a series of years, it is now compelled to reduce the number to sixty thousand. If four years of this violation of natural law and neighbor’s rights has reduced the annual slaughter of seal by 40 per cent., it is easy to see how short a period will be required to work the total destruction of the fisheries.
The ground upon which Her Majesty’s Government justifies, or at least defends the course of the Canadian vessels, rests upon the fact that they are committing their acts of destruction on the high seas, viz, more than 3 marine miles from the shoreline. It is doubtful whether [Page 369] Her Majesty’s Government would abide by this rule if the attempt were made to interfere with the pearl fisheries of Ceylon, which extend more than 20 miles from the shore-line and have been enjoyed by England without molestation ever since their acquisition. So well recognized is the British ownership of those fisheries, regardless of the limit of the 3-mile line, that Her Majesty’s Government feels authorized to sell the pearl-fishing right from year to year to the highest bidder. Nor is it credible that modes of fishing on the Grand Banks, altogether practicable but highly destructive, would be justified or even permitted by Great Britain on the plea that the vicious acts were committed more than 3 miles from shore.
There are, according to scientific authority, “great colonies of fish” on the “Newfoundland banks,” These colonies resemble the seats of great populations on land. They remain stationary, having a limited range of water in which to live and die. In these great “colonies” it is, according to expert judgment, comparatively easy to explode dynamite or giant powder in such manner as to kill vast quantities of fish, and at the same time destroy countless numbers of eggs. Stringent laws have been necessary to prevent the taking of fish by the use of dynamite in many of the rivers and lakes of the United States. The same mode of fishing could readily be adopted with effect on the more shallow parts of the banks, but the destruction of fish in proportion to the catch, says a high authority, might be as great as ten thousand to one. Would Her Majesty’s Government think that so wicked an act could not be prevented and its perpetrators punished simply because it had been committed outside of the 3-mile line?
Why are not the two cases parallel? The Canadian vessels are engaged in the taking of fur seal in a manner that destroys the power of reproduction and insures the extermination of the species. In exterminating the species an article useful to mankind is totally destroyed in order that temporary and immoral gain may be acquired by a few persons. By the employment of dynamite on the banks it is not probable that the total destruction of fish could be accomplished, but a serious diminution of a valuable food for man might assuredly result. Does Her Majesty’s Government seriously maintain that the law of nations is powerless to prevent such violation of the common rights of man? Are the supporters of justice in all nations to be declared incompetent to prevent wrongs so odious and so destructive?
In the judgment of this Government the law of the sea is not lawlessness. Nor can the law of the sea and the liberty which it confers and which it protects, be perverted to justify acts which are immoral in themselves, which inevitably tend to results against the interests and against the welfare of mankind. One step beyond that which Her Majesty’s Government has taken in this contention, and piracy finds its justification. The President does not conceive it possible that Her Majesty’s Government could in fact be less indifferent to these evil results than is the Government of the United States. But he hopes that Her Majesty’s Government will, after this frank expression of views, more readily comprehend the position of the Government of the United States touching this serious question. This Government has been ready to concede much in order to adjust all differences of view, and has, in the judgment of the President, already proposed a solution not only equitable but generous. Thus far Her Majesty’s Government has declined to accept the proposal of the United States, The President now awaits with deep interest, not unmixed with solicitude, any proposition for reasonable adjustment which Her Majesty’s Government [Page 370] may submit. The forcible resistance to which this Government is constrained in the Behring Sea is, in the President’s judgment, demanded not only by the necessity of defending the traditional and long-established rights of the United States, but also the rights of good morals and of good government the world over.
In this contention the Government of the United States has no occasion and no desire to withdraw or modify the positions which it has at any time maintained against the claims of the Imperial Government of Russia. The United States will not withhold from any nation the privileges which it demanded for itself when Alaska was part of the Russian Empire. Nor is the Government of the United States disposed to exercise in those possessions any less power or authority than it was willing to concede to the Imperial Government of Russia when its sovereignty extended over them. The President is persuaded that all friendly nations will concede to the United States the same rights and privileges on the lands and in the waters of Alaska which the same friendly nations always conceded to the Empire of Russia.
I have, etc.,