With the imperfect information concerning that subject which this Government has until recently had, it seemed probable that it might not only appear but might even be a material point in that case that the so-called Blanche was fired upon by the Montgomery more than three miles from and within six miles of the coast of Cuba. It seemed probable to the undersigned that, in that case, he would be obliged to examine in direct connection with the case of the so-called Blanche, the claim of Spain to a jurisdiction outside of three statute miles in the waters which surround the island of Cuba, and so that instead of a speculative one the question would have become inevitably a practical one. It now appears that the injuries complained of by Spain, so far as they have been entertained in the case of the so-called Blanche, were committed on the very shore of the island of Cuba, and within the universally conceded and unquestioned jurisdiction of Spain. The reason for the delay of this note has thus passed away." Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Tassara, Span. min. Dec. 16, 1862; MS. Notes to Spain, VII. 331. See Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Welles, Sec. of Navy, Oct. 10, 1862; 58 MS. Dom. Let. 324. "The undersigned, Secretary of State of the United States, has the honor to recur to the subject of the claim of the Government of Her Catholic Majesty to a maritime jurisdiction of six miles, in the waters which surround the island of Cuba. The most deliberate and respectful consideration has been bestowed upon the arguments in support of that claim which have been submitted to him by Señor Gabriel G. Tassara, Her Catholic Majesty's minister plenipotentiary near the United States. "There seems to be an entire agreement between Mr. Tassara and the undersigned upon the proposition that Spain has an undoubted jurisdiction to some extent over the sea adjacent to the island of Cuba. It is upon the line of this exclusive maritime jurisdiction that the question which is to be considered arises. The undersigned has maintained as a general principle, announced by publicists and accepted by maritime powers, that the jurisdiction of maritime nations extends three miles over the seas to their coasts. "Mr. Tassara is not understood to deny this proposition. But he insists that this principle has its exceptions, and that some states, and among them the United States, habitually claim and exercise a wider jurisdiction. While this fact is cheerfully admitted, it does not seem to the undersigned conclusive in favor of the claim of Spain. The exceptions are so few and so special that they do not disturb or impair the general principle that three miles is the legal boundary of external maritime jurisdiction. Mr. Tassara seems to assume, however, that as there are some existing and acknowledged exceptions to that principle, so there are also other existing exceptions which ought to be acknowledged, and that the jurisdiction for which he is now contending is such an exception. He very truly assumes that wherever such an exception actually exists, evidence of it will be found in the statutes or decrees of the maritime power which asserts it. As such evidence, he quotes several royal decrees of Spain, some ancient and others modern, which declare that the jurisdiction of Spain in the waters which surround her coasts extends to the limit of six miles. "Nevertheless it cannot be admitted, nor indeed is Mr. Tassara understood to claim, that the mere assertion of a sovereign, by an act of legislation, however solemn, can have the effect to establish and fix its external maritime jurisdiction. His right to a jurisdiction of three miles is derived not from his own decree but from the law of nations, and exists even though he may never have proclaimed or asserted it by any decree or declaration whatsoever. He cannot, by a mere decree, extend the limit and fix it at six miles, because, if he could, he could in the same manner, and upon motives of interest. ambition, or even upon caprice, fix it at ten, or twenty, or fifty miles, without the consent or acquiescence of other powers which have a common right with himself in the freedom of all the oceans. Such a pretension could never be successfully or rightfully maintained. The statutes which Mr. Tassara has recited are therefore regarded as showing what certainly is by no means unimportant, that Spain at an early day asserted, and has on different occasions since that time reasserted, in her domestic legislation, a claim to an exceptional jurisdiction of three miles in addition to the three miles of jurisdiction conceded by the law of nations. "A claim thus asserted and urged must necessarily be now respected and conceded by the United States, if it could be shown that on its being brought to their notice they had acquiesced in it, or that on its being brought to the notice of other powers it had been so widely conceded by them as to imply a general recognition of it by the maritime powers of the world. It is just here, however, that the claim of Spain seems to need support. Nations do not equally study each other's statute books, and are not chargeable with notice of national pretensions resting upon foreign legislation. The undersigned cannot admit that this claim of Spain to a maritime jurisdiction of six miles was recognized or admitted by the United States in the treaty of friendship, amity, and commerce between the United States and Spain which was celebrated in 1795, insomuch as there is no evidence. that this peculiar and exceptional claim of maritime jurisdiction was then brought by the one party to the knowledge of the other. The case of the El Dorado seems to be the only one in which this claim of Spain has been brought to the notice of this Government. In regard to that case, all that Mr. Tassara is understood to insist upon is that the Spanish Government did not renounce the claim, nor renew it, while it is not denied that this Government declined to concede it. "Within the period which has elapsed since the date of the first royal decree asserting the claim to which Mr. Tassara has directed the attention of the undersigned, there have been many and long periods of naval war, but the undersigned has not been given to understand that any maritime power having been made actually acquainted with the claim of Spain to a jurisdiction of six miles around the island of Cuba has acquiesced therein, or recognized the same. "It results from these remarks, that while it is admitted that on the part of Spain the claim is not one of new creation, it is practically one that has only recently been presented to the United States, and for aught that appears is entirely new to other maritime powers. "The undersigned is far from intimating that these facts furnish conclusive reasons for denying the claim a respectful consideration. On the contrary, he very cheerfully proceeds to consider a farther argument, derived, as Mr. Tassara supposes, from reason and justice, which he has urged in respect to the claim. This ground is, that the shore of Cuba is, by reason of its islets and smaller rocks, such as to require that the maritime jurisdiction of Cuba, in order to purposes of effective defense and police, should be extended to the breadth of six miles. The undersigned has examined what are supposed to be accurate charts of the coast of Cuba, and if he is not misled by some error of the chart, or of the process of examination, he has ascertained that nearly half of the cost of Cuba is practically free from reefs, rocks, and keys, and that the seas adjacent to that part of the island which includes the great harbors of Cabanos, Havana, Matanzas, and Santiago are very deep, while in fact the greatest depth of the passage between Cuba and Florida is found within five miles of the coast of Cuba, off the harbor of Havana. "The undersigned has further ascertained, as he thinks, that the line of keys which confront other portions of the Cuban coast resemble, in dimensions, constitution and vicinity to the mainland, the keys which lig off the southern Florida coast of the United States. The undersigned assumes that this line of keys is properly to be regarded as the exterior coast line, and that the inland jurisdiction ceases there, while the maritime jurisdiction of Spain begins from the exterior sea front of those keys. "In view of the considerations and facts which have been thus presented, the undersigned is obliged to state that the Government of the United States is not prepared to admit that the jurisdiction of Spain in the waters which surround the island of Cuba lawfully Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Tassara, Spanish min., Aug. 10, 1863, See letter of Mr. Bache, superintendent of the Coast Survey, to Mr. 66 In a note of August 9, 1863, which was received after the foregoing communication was prepared, Mr. Tassara notified Mr. Seward that the Spanish Government had determined to insist upon its claim by naval force after the ensuing October. Mr. Seward at once replied that the United States, under the circumstances then existing, could not concede the claim with a due regard to its necessities, its rights, or its national self-respect. He stated, however, that the United States would agree to refer the claim to the examination of all the great maritime states; but that, as such a reference would be dilatory if not impracticable, the President was willing, subject to the constitutional consent of the Senate, to refer the question to any of those powers, whether Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Russia, Prussia, the Hanse Towns, Denmark, or Italy. Or, if Spain should prefer it, the United States would appoint one or more delegates to confer with an equal number appointed by Spain; and these delegates might, in case of disagreement, choose an umpire, the decision of all the delegates or of the umpire to be final. Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Tassara, Span. min., Aug. 10, 1863, MS. See, also, Mr. Seward to Mr. Tassara, Sept. 2, 1863, id. 421. See also, Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Welles, Sec. of Navy, July 6, The terms of a convention were afterwards agreed on for the submission of the correspondence to the King of the Belgians, in order that he might, as arbitrator, determine the question whether the maritime jurisdiction of Her Catholic Majesty in the waters surrounding the waters of Cuba "extends only three miles, or whether it extends six miles from the line of the coast or of the islets thereabouts." Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Tassara, Span. min., Oct. 9, 1863, MS. The Spanish claim of jurisdiction may have been acted on by the com- "The maritime jurisdiction of Spain may be acknowledged to extend not only to a marine league beyond the coast of Cuba itself, but also to the same distance from the coast line of the several islets or keys with which Cuba itself is surrounded. Any acts of Spanish authority within that line can not be called into question, provided they shall not be at variance with law or treaties." Mr. Fish, Sec. of State, to Mr. Borie, Sec. of the Navy, May 18, 1869, 81 "The instruction from the foreign office to Mr. Watson, of the 25th of September last, a copy of which was communicated by that gentleman to this Department, in his note of the 17th of October, directs him to ascertain the views of this Government in regard to the extent of maritime jurisdiction which can properly be claimed by any power, and whether we have ever recognized the claim of Spain to a six-mile limit or have ever protested against such claim. "In reply I have the honor to inform you that this Government has uniformly, under every administration which has had occasion to consider the subject, objected to the pretension of Spain adverted to, upon the same ground and in similar terms to those contained in the instruction of the Earl of Derby." Mr. Fish, Sec. of State, to Sir Edward Thornton, Brit. min., Jan. 22, 1875, In 1880--81 a discussion took place between the United States and Spain in relation to the visitation and firing upon of the American vessels Ethel A. Merritt, Eunice P. Newcomb, George Washington, and Hattie Haskell by Spanish gunboats near the island of Cuba, in May, June, and July, 1880. There was a wide variance between the statements of the officers of the vessels and statements of the officers of |