Reminiscences of the Bering Sea Arbitration

Extract

On February 29, 1892, a treaty was celebrated between the United States and Great Britain providing for the submission to arbitration of the issues which had arisen between those countries respecting the preservation of the valuable herd of fur seals of the Pribilof Islands in Bering Sea. These issues had come to a head in 1886 under President Cleveland, had remained very active throughout the whole of the succeeding administration of President Harrison and had lasted into the second administration of President Cleveland. During part of this period the feelings of the two governments ran high while the issues held the attention of the thinking public. Today, however, they have been largely forgotten and it would not have occurred to me to revive them during these stirring times had not my friend Mr. Frederic R. Coudert, who accompanied his distinguished father to Paris in 1893 as a youthful but very keen observer, requested that as the sole surviving member of the American delegation I review the salient features of this great effort to compose international controversies by reason rather than by a resort to arms. In complying with this request I shall at the same time seek to correct an impression held by many that the United States had a poor case, whereas in respect of one of the two principal issues, namely that of its ownership in the seals, it had a very good case, and in respect of the other, namely the regulations necessary for their preservation should ownership be denied by the tribunal, it had an unanswerable case on which it won what our opponents considered at the time to be a substantial victory though it turned out to be an inadequate one. The position of the United States on this second issue was fully vindicated several years after the arbitration.