the sixtieth parallel. From that point the boundary is designated by the almost indefinite prolongation northward of the one hundred and forty-first degree of longitude west. It is plain, therefore, that this treaty, like the Russo-American treaty, limited the "northwest coast" to that part of the coast between the fiftieth and sixtieth parallels of north latitude,-as fully set forth by Mr. Middleton in the protocols preceding the treaty between the United States and Russia. The negotiators never touched one foot of the boundary of the Behring Sea, whether on continent or island, and never even made a reference to it. Its nearest point, in Bristol Bay, was a thousand miles distant from the field of negotiation between the powers. It must not be forgotten that this entire negotiation of the three powers proceeded with full knowledge and recognition of the ukase of 1821. While all questions touching the respective rights of the powers on the northwest coast between the fiftieth and sixtieth parallels were discussed and pressed by one side or the other, and finally agreed upon, the terms of the ukase of 1821, in which the Emperor set forth so clearly the rights claimed and exercised by Russia in the Behring Sea, were untouched and unquestioned. These rights were therefore admitted by all the powers negotiating as within the exercise of Russia's lawful authority then, and they were left inviolate by England during all the subsequent continuance of Russia's dominion over Alaska. These treaties were therefore a practical renunciation, both on the part of England and the United States, of any rights in the waters of Behring Sea during the period of Russia's sovereignty. They left the Behring Sea and all its coasts and islands precisely as the ukase of Alexander in 1821 left them,-that is with a prohibition against any vessel approaching nearer to the coast than 100 Italian miles, under danger of confiscation. The original ukase of Alexander (1821) claimed as far south as the fifty-first degree of north latitude, with the inhibition of 100 miles from the coast applying to the whole. The result of the protest of Mr. Adams, followed by the co-operation of Great Britain, was to force Russia back to 54.40 as her southern boundary. But there was no renunciation whatever on the part of Russia as to the Behring Sea, to which the ukase especially and primarily applied. As a piece of legislation this ukase was as authoritative in the dominions of Russia as an act of Parliament is in the dominions of Great Britain or an act of Congress in the territory of the United States. Except as voluntarily modified by Russia in the treaty with the United States, April 17, 1824, and in the treaty with Great Britain, February 16, 1825, the ukase of 1821 stood as the law controlling the Russian possessions in America until the close of Russia's ownership by transfer to this Government. Both the United States and Great Britain recognized it, respected it, obeyed it. It did not, as so many suppose, declare the Behring Sea to be mare clausum. It did declare that the waters, to the extent of 100 miles from the shores, were reserved for the subjects of the Russian Empire. Of course many hundred miles east and west and north and south, were thus intentionally left by Russia for the whale fishery and for fishing open and free to the world, of which other nations took large advantage. Perhaps in pursuing this advantage foreigners did not always keep 100 miles from the shore, but the theory of right on which they conducted their business unmolested was that they observed the conditions of the ukase. But the 100-mile restriction performed the function for which it was specially designed in preventing foreign nations from molesting, disturb ng, or by any possibility sharing in the fur trade. The fur trade formed i the principal, almost the sole employment of the Russian American Company. It formed its employment, indeed, to such a degree that it soon became known only as the Russian American Fur Company, and quite suggestively that name is given to the company by Lord Salisbury in the dispatch to which I am replying. While, therefore, there may have been a large amount of lawful whaling and fishing in the Behring Sea, the taking of furs by foreigners was always and under all circumstances illicit. Eighteen years after the treaty of 1825 (in 1843) Great Britain made a commercial treaty with Russia, based on the principle of reciprocity of advantages, but the rights of the Russian American Company, which under both ukases included the sovereigntry over the sea to the extent of 100 miles from the shores, were reserved by special clause, in a separate and special article, signed after the principal articles of the treaty had been concluded and signed. Although British rights were enlarged with nearly all other parts of the Russian Empire, her relations with the Russian possessions and with the Behring Sea remained at precisely the same point where the treaty of 1825 had placed them. Again in 1859 Great Britain still further enlarged her commercial relations with the Empire of Russia, and again the "possessions" and the Behring Sea were held firmly in their relations to the Russian American Company as they had been held in the treaty of 1843. It is especially notable that both in the treaty of 1843 and the treaty of 1859 it is declared that "in regard to commerce and navigation in the Russian possessions on the north west coast of America the convention concluded at St. Petersburg, February 16, 1825, shall continue in force." The same distinction and the same restrictions which Mr. Adams made in regard to the northwest coast of America were still observed, and Great Britain's access from or to the interior of the continent was still limited to that part of the coast between 54.40 and a point near Mount Saint Elias. The language of the three Russo British treaties of 1825, 1843, and 1859 corresponds with that employed in Mr. Adams' dispatch to Mr. Middleton, to which reference has so frequently been made. This shows that the true meaning of Mr. Adams' paragraph is the key, and indeed the only key by which the treaties can be correctly interpreted and by which expressions apparently contradictory or unintelligible can be readily harmonized. Immediately following the partial quotation of Mr. Adams's dispatch, Lord Salisbury quotes the case of the United States brig Loriot as having some bearing on the question relating to the Behring Sea. The case happened on the 15th of September, 1836, and Mr. Forsyth, Secretary of State, in a dispatch to the United States minister at St. Petersburg, declared the course of the Russians in arresting the vessel to be a vio lation of the rights of the citizens of the United States. He claimed that the citizens of the United States had the right immemorially as well as by the stipulations of the treaty of 1824 to fish in those waters. Lord Salisbury's understanding of the case differs enti ely from that held by the Government of the United States. The Loriot was not arrested in Behring Sea at all, nor was she engaged in taking furs. She was arrested, as Mr. Forsyth in his dispatch says, in latitude 54:55, more than sixty miles south of Sitka, on the "northwest coast." to which, and to which only, the treaty of 1824 referred. Russia upheld its action on the ground that the ten-year term provided in the fourth article of the treaty had closed two years before. The case was made the basis of an application on the part of the United States Government for a renewal of that article. This application was pressed for several years, but finally and absolutely refused by the Russian Government. Under the claim of Russia that the term of ten years had expired, the United States failed to secure any redress in the Loriot case. With all due respect to Lord Salisbury's judgment, the case of the Loriot sustains the entire correctness of the position of the United States in this contention. It only remains to say that whatever duty Great Britain owed to Alaska as a Russian province, whatever she agreed to do or to refrain from doing, touching Alaska and the Behring Sea, was not changed by the mere fact of the transfer of sovereignty to the United States. It was explicitly declared, in the sixth article of the treaty by which the territory was ceded by Russia, that "the cession hereby made conveys all the rights, franchises, and privileges now belonging to Russia in the said territory or dominions and appurtenances thereto." Neither by the treaty with Russia of 1825, nor by its renewal in 1843, nor by its second renewal in 1859, did Great Britain gain any right to take seals in Behring Sea. In fact, those treaties were a prohibition upon her which she steadily respected so long as Alaska was a Russian province. It is for Great Britain now to show by what law she gained rights in that sea after the transfer of its sovereignty to the United States. During all the time elapsing between the treaty of 1825 and the cession of Alaska to the United States in 1867, Great Britain never affirmed the right of her subjects to capture fur-seal in the Behring Sea; and, as a matter of fact, her subjects did not, during that long period, attempt to catch seals in the Behring Sea. Lord Salisbury, in replying to my assertion that these lawless intrusions upon the fur-seal fisheries began in 1886, declares that they had occurred before. He points out one attempt in 1870, in which forty-seven skins were found on board an intruding vessel; in 1872 there was a rumor that expeditions were about to fit out in Australia and Victoria for the purpose of taking seals in the Behring Sea; in 1874 some reports were heard that vessels had entered the sea for that purpose; one case was reported in 1875; two cases in 1884; two also in 1885. These cases, I may say without intending disrespect to his lordship, prove the truth of the statement which he endeavors to controvert, because they form just a sufficient number of exceptions to establish the fact that the destructive intrusion began in 1886. But I refer to them now for the purpose of showing that his lordship does not attempt to cite the intrusion of a single British sealer into the Behring Sea until after Alaska had been transferred to the United States. am justified, therefore, in repeating the questions which I addressed to Her Majesty's Government on the 22d of last January, and which still remain unanswered, viz: I Whence did the ships of Canada derive the right to do, in 1886, that which they had refrained from doing for nearly ninety years? Upon what grou ds did Her Majesty's Government defend, in the year 1886, a course of conduct in the Behring Sea which had been 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? I have, etc., JAMES G. BLAINE. No. 28. Sir Julian Pauncefote to Mr. Blaine. WASHINGTON, June 30, 1890. SIR: In your note of the 29th of May last, which I duly transmitted to the Marquis of Salisbury, there are several references to communciations which passed between the two Governments in the time of your predecessor. I have now received a dispatch from Lord Salisbury, copy of which I have the honor to inclose, pointing out that there is some error in the impressions which you have gathered from the records in the State Department with respect to those communications. I have, etc., JULIAN PAUNCEFOTE. [Inclosure.] The Marquis of Salisbury to Sir Julian Pauncefote. No. 126.] It contains several references to communications which passed between the two Governments in the time of Mr. Blaine's predecessor, especially in the spring of 1888. Without referring at present to other portions of Mr. Blaine's note I wish only now to point out some error in the impressions which he has gathered from the records in his office with respect to those communications. He states that on the 23d April of that year I informed the American chargé d'affaires, Mr. White, that it was proposed to give effect to a seal convention by order in council, not by act of Parliament. This was a mistake. It was very natural that Mr. White should not have apprehended me correctly when I was describing the somewhat complicated arrangements by which agreements of this kind are brought into force in England. But two or three days after the 23d April he called to make inquiry on the subject, and in reply to his question the following letter was addressed to him by my instructions: FOREIGN OFFICE, April 27, 1888. MY DEAR WHITE: Lord Salisbury desires me to express his regret that he is not yet in a position to make any further communication to you on the subject of the seal fisheries in Behring Sea. After his interview with you and M. de Staal he had to refer to the Canadian Government, the Board of Trade, and the Admiralty, but has as yet only obtained the opinion of the Admiralty. The next step is to bring a bill into Parliament. Yours, etc., ERIC BARRINGTON. On the 28th, Mr. White replied: LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, London, April 28, 1888. MY DEAR BARRINGTON: Thanks for your note, respecting the final sentence of which, "The next step is to bring a bill into Parliament," I must trouble you with a line. I understood Lord Salisbury to say when I saw him with M. de Staal, and again last week alone, that it is now proposed to give effect to the conventional arrangement for the protection of seals by an order in council, not by act of Parliament. When Mr. Phelps left the latter was thought necessary, and last week I received a telegram from the Secretary of State, asking me to obtain confidentially a copy of the proposed act of Parliament, with a view to assimilating our contemplated act of Congress thereto. I replied, after seeing Lord Salisbury last Saturday, that there would be no bill introduced in Parliament, but an order in council. May I ask if this be now incorrect, as, in that event, I should particularly like to correct my former statement by this day's mail. To this the following reply was on the same date addressed to Mr. White: FOREIGN OFFICE, April 28, 1888. MY DEAR WHITE: Lord Salisbury is afraid that he did not make himself understood when last he spoke to you about the Seal Fisheries Convention. An act of Parliament is necessary to give power to our authorities to act on the provisions of the convention when it is signed. The order in council will be merely the machinery which the act will provide for the purpose of bringing its provisions into force. The object of this machinery is to enable the Government to wait till the other two powers are ready. But neither convention nor bill is drafted yet, because we have not got the opinions from Canada which are necessary to enable us to proceed. Yours, etc., ERIC BARRINGTON. It is evident from this correspondence that if the United States Government was misled upon the 23d April into the belief that Her Majesty's Government could proceed in the matter without an act of parliament, or could proceed without previous reference to Canada, it was a mistake which must have been entirely dissipated by the correspondence which followed in the ensuing week. Mr. Blaine is also under a misconception in imagining that I ever gave any verbal assurance, or any promise of any kind, with respect to the terms of the projected convention. Her Majesty's Government always have been, and are still, anxious for the arrangement of a convention which shall provide whatever close time in whatever localities is necessary for the preservation of the fur-seal species. But I have represented that the details must be the subject of discussion, a discussion to which those who are locally interested must of necessity contribute. I find the record of the following conversation about the date to which Mr. Blaine refers: The Marquis of Salisbury to Sir L. West. FOREIGN OFFICE, March 17, 1888. SIR Since forwarding to you my dispatch No. 23 of the 22d ultimo, I have been in communication with the Russian ambassador at this court, and have invited his excellency to ascertain whether his Government would authorize him to discuss with Mr. Phelps and myself the suggestion made by Mr. Bayard in his dispatch of the 7th February, that concerted action should be taken by the United States, Great Britain, and other interested powers, in order to preserve from extermination the fur seals which at certain seasons are found in Behring Sea. Copies of the correspondence on this question which has passed between M. de Staal and myself is inclosed herewith. I request that you will inform Mr. Bayard of the steps which have been taken, with a view to the initiation of negotiations for an agreement between the three powers principally concerned in the maintenance of the seal fisheries. But in so doing you should state that this action on the part of Her Majesty's Government must not be taken as an admission of the rights of jurisdiction in Behring Sea exercised there by the United States authorities during the fishing seasons of 1886-'87 and 1887-'88, nor as affecting the claims which Her Majesty's Government will have to present on account of wrongful seizures which have taken place of British vessels engaged in the seal fishing industry. I am, etc., SALISBURY. In pursuance of this dispatch, the suggestion made by Mr. Bayard, to which I referred, was discussed, and negotiations were initiated for an agreement between the three powers. The following dispatch con |