nt are all
reasonably within the domain of amicable negotiation, and there is no
existing subject of dispute between the United States and any foreign
power that is not susceptible of satisfactory adjustment by frank
diplomatic treatment.

The questions between Great Britain and the United States relating to
the rights of American fishermen, under treaty and international comity,
in the territorial waters of Canada and Newfoundland, I regret to say,
are not yet satisfactorily adjusted.

These matters were fully treated in my message to the Senate of February
20, 1888,[19] together with which a convention, concluded under my
authority with Her Majesty's Government on the 15th of February last,
for the removal of all causes of misunderstanding, was submitted by me
for the approval of the Senate.

This treaty having been rejected by the Senate, I transmitted a message
to the Congress on the 23d of August last[20] reviewing the transactions
and submitting for consideration certain recommendations for legislation
concerning the important questions involved.

Afterwards, on the 12th of September,[21] in response to a resolution
of the Senate, I again communicated fully all the information in my
possession as to the action of the government of Canada affecting the
commercial relations between the Dominion and the United States,
including the treatment of American fishing vessels in the ports and
waters of British North America.

These communications have all been published, and therefore opened to
the knowledge of both Houses of Congress, although two were addressed to
the Senate alone.

Comment upon or repetition of their contents would be superfluous, and I
am not aware that anything has since occurred which should be added to
the facts therein stated. Therefore I merely repeat, as applicable to
the present time, the statement which will be found in my message to the
Senate of September 12 last, that--

Since March 3, 1887, no case has been reported to the Department of
State wherein complaint was made of unfriendly or unlawful treatment of
American fishing vessels on the part of the Canadian authorities in
which reparation was not promptly and satisfactorily obtained by the
United States consul-general at Halifax.

Having essayed in the discharge of my duty to procure by negotiation the
settlement of a long-standing cause of dispute and to remove a constant
menace to the good relations of the two count