fish-oil, granted reciprocity of inside fisheries
to British fishermen, and finally provided that the question of
compensation should be referred to three Commissioners.(4)

It would not be just to impute carelessness to the American members of
the Joint High Commission in framing the articles of the treaty
relating to the fisheries. It is quite evident however that they had
not closely studied the question, and had allowed the British
Commissioners to gain an advantage. It was a mistake to agree to a new
confirmation of the treaty of 1818, apparently establishing it as the
basis of all our rights and giving to it the authoritative position
which the treaty of 1782 originally held and should have continued to
hold on this question. We might not be able to annul the treaty of
1818, but it was not wise to forfeit, by the assent of so imposing a
body as the Joint High Commission, our right of protest against the
injustice of its provisions and to agree practically to the assertion
that our fishing-rights began in 1818. But a much graver blunder was
committed. Our Commissioners had very justly maintained that the
admission of Canadian fish and fish-oil free of duty into the United
States would be more than an equivalent for the fishery rights to be
conceded by the British Government. They had also maintained that for
a concession of those rights in perpetuity the Government of the United
States would not be willing to pay more than $1,000,000. Holding these
views, believing as they did that we were giving more than we were
gaining, the Commissioners nevertheless consented to a reference to
determine _how much in addition we should pay to Great Britain_. The
agreement certainly should have been to ascertain to which party, if
either, a money consideration should be paid. Still further, if they
were willing to imply in advance that a money consideration might be
due to Great Britain and not to the United States, a maximum limit
should have been inserted in the treaty beyond which the American
Government would not be willing that any award should extend. But
by practically conceded, in the first place, that money should be paid
to Great Britain, and by leaving the Reference to determine the
amount without any limit whatever, they offered a great temptation to
wrong dealing, against which the United States had reserved no defense
and could secure no redress.

Of the three Commissioners referred to in the Article prov