The Fisheries Dispute in Newfoundland: To the Editor of The Standard: Sir, No one can feel a warmer and deeper interest in Newfoundland (the country of my birth), and in its welfare than I do; but I am bound to say that such wild and unreasoning advocacy as that of some of the well-meaning correspondents who write to English journals is calculated to do the cause of the Colony in the French Treaty Question more hard that good. I may observe in simine that I am the Judge of the Supreme Court of the Colony to whom the presentments of the Grand Juries were made, and some of whose directions thereon have been recently quoted. The fault in the agitation of the past for the readjustment of the Treaties and for the establishment of a more satisfactory modus vivendi is exactly that into which these correspondents have fallen, when they ignore the express terms of the Treaties as if they possessed not the slightest knowledge of their contents, and talk about their abolition as if we had nothing to do but to pass a repealing statute, and there were no other party to be consulted; while they bluster about “bundling out the French,” or voting for annexation, as if such suggestions were not simply absurd and impossible. Intelligent fishermen have already learned, if only by the long experience of its folly, the worthlessness of diatribes of that kind. As a lawyer (and I do not understand how any reasonable man who has given any thoughtful consideration to this question can do otherwise), I have never been able to hold that a Treaty and Royal Declaration which, by their express terms, engage that “his Britannic Majesty will take the most positive measures for preventing his subjects from interruption in any manner by their competition (par leur concurrence) the Fishery of the French, and that he will for that purpose (a cet effet) cause the fixed settlements which shall be formed there to be removed,” confer a right of Fishery in which British and French subjects shall be engaged concurrently and in common in the same localities. When such a position as this is taken the French become unapproachable, and a common base of negotiation is destroyed. We would not be included to give a patient hearing to the descendants of the French colonists of Lower Canada, or the Mauritius, who at this time of day might express a preference for returning to the allegiance of their ancestors. The little colony of St. Pierre and this right of fishing on part of the Newfoundland Coast, we must remember are the only remnants of the once great French Colonial Empire in North America. The treaties are in this day unquestionably a great misfortune for Newfoundland, but just as unquestionably they exist for whatever they are worth. They are utterly unsuited to the conditions of the present day, and their satisfactory working in their present form is impracticable. As a matter of fact, important English settlements have sprung up upon the “French Shore” and these have been so long possessed and enjoyed without any concurrent user by the French, that upon principles of legal equity they would probably be held to have lapsed from the uses of a French fishery, which either never has been or has long ceased to be prosecuted in those places. These settlements certainly would never be removed, but their welfare and progress continue to be overshadowed by the Treaties, since the passing of the Bait Act by the Newfoundland Legislature, excluding the French from the right of purchasing bait from English subjects, the French had resorted tone or more of these place to take bait fishes for themselves, and the French take this bait not only for the purposes of their summer coastal fishery, but for exportation in St. Pierre and for use in their Bank fishing ships. Their right to do this, particularly in its latter phases, is now contested by the inhabitants of the coast, and with much force of argument. Now this is a fair question for difference of opinion, and one which ought to be settled or adjusted. Again, the French claim to prosecute a lobster-tinning business on the coast, and to exclude British subjects from it, is one which they boldly assert as coming within the general definition of a Fishery, and the question is now engaging the attention of the French Government and Legislative chamber. Now, upon this contest I had occasion more than two years ago to give directions in reply to presentments from grand juries, and I formed an opinion which is, I think the only one to be fairly gathered from the Treaties, and that is, that the French possess no such rights. My reasons for this opinion are as follows: the origin of the Newfoundland Fisheries was the capture of codfish. That was “the Fishery” of the Treaties, and the only Fishery which the contracting parties had in view. The language of the Treaties is such as to refer to no other, and by its significant terms to exclude all others. The Treaty of Utrecht (1713) declares it to be unlawful for the French to “erect any buildings besides stages made of boards, and huts necessary and usual for drying fish.” By the Treaty of Paris (1763) it was to be lawful for them “to catch fish and dry them on land.” It is hardly necessary to observe that all this applies to a Cod Fishery and has no application whatsoever to a lobster Fishery, or to the establishment of factories and lobster tinning. By the Treaty of Versailles (1783) the French fishermen were to enjoy “the Fishery assigned to them by the Treaty of Utrecht,” and it said, “the method of carrying on the Fishery which as at all times been acknowledged shall be the plan upon which the Fishery shall be carried on;” and the Fishery is spoken of in the interchanged declarations that “which has been the object of the new arrangements.” By the Treaty of Paris (1814) the French right of Fishery was “replaced upon the footing in which it stood in 1792.” It seemed to me, therefore, not to be open to serious questions that the taking of lobsters and the erection of factories for their preservation as an article of food were never included in these Treaties. My directions, consequently, were to the effect that the French possessed no right to prosecute this industry, and that in those places in which the French were not prosecuting the Cod Fishery they had no right to interfere with the operations of British subjects. These directions were submitted to the Imperial Government, and I had the satisfaction of finding that they were followed in the succeeding season by such action upon the part of the Naval authorities upon the coast that the British factories were and have been supported. With reference to the territorial, as distinguished from the maritime, occupation and use of the coast, I have always held that, unless such use and occupation amounted to an interruption of the French Cod Fishery, there was no right of interference or complaint upon the part of the French. This position has been fortified by the Imperial Government, which has given its assent, in the faith of its undoubted Sovereign right, to the exercise of all the functions of the Government upon the coast, and to measures now in force for its representation in the Colonial Legislature, and for grants of land to be enjoyed on the condition that they do not interrupt the operations of the French Fishery. The Government of the Mother Country may have hastened slowly; but its cautions footsteps have been in the direction of establishing the colony in the full enjoyment of those maritime and territorial rights which were handed over to it. English journals may well rebuke those who would look to the United States of America to assume the dirty work of repudiation of Treaties in return for annexation. We have no reason to believe that the great Republic has any desire for the appropriation of British territory; we may be certain that she will never attempt annexation except in harmonious action with all concerned when the unification of North America may have taken the form of approved policy, and that under no circumstances would she entertain it with any such condition as that suggested; and whatever the advantage which might accrue to Newfoundland by confederation with Canada, release from the fetters of these Treaties would not be one of them. The difficulty has to be met under any circumstances, either by compensation in the form of purchase or exchange (which France is unlikely to accept, seeing that the main raison d’etre of its Newfoundland connection is the maintenance of a Naval nursery), or by the adoption of the most sensible practical working agreement of which the circumstances will admit. The Treaties are of that disabling character which should, no doubt, subject them to the strictest construction as against foreign claims in derogation of the rights of the Sovereign proprietors and if this new claim to prosecute the lobster business, which has become a valuable industry, cannot be supported, there ought to be no hesitation in preventing it on the part of the French, and in securing its peaceable and profitable pursuit to the British trader and fisherman, to whom present impediments in other respects are already so great a hardship. In justice to both French and English subjects on the coast, be it said that great credit is due for the forbearance and avoidance of violent measures which have, on the whole, marked the history of this embarrassing and anomalous International arrangement. In conclusion, I would say with regard to the comparison of the general condition of the Newfoundland fishing population with that of the Scotch crofters that, while I have no accurate knowledge of the latter, which probably varies much with people and places, if it is intend to imply that ours are a degraded or very destitute people, I beg indignantly to repudiate the imputation and to assert that, on the whole, a finer population is probably not to be found on the face of the earth, while with regard to the material condition of the colony, although it is affected by the variations to which its chief industry is subject, its soundness is well attested by the fact the public revenues (without direct taxation) amounts, for a population of two hundred thousand, to over a quarter million pounds a year, and by the high standing of its commercial credit. I am, Sir, your obedient servant: ROBERT J. PINSENT, 19 Dawlish Road, Teignmouth, Devon, January 19th.
[see also St. James’s Gazette: 21st January 1890]
Transcribed in whole or part from scanned originals: Presented with or without modified text and punctuation. For absolute accuracy refer to the original newspapers. Source: The British Newspaper Archive.
Referenced
GRO0747 Hennock: Robert John Pinsent: 1834 – 1893