The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1870-12-01
THE FISHERY QUESTION.
What John Bull thinks OF General
Butler.


The London EconomiS, thinks General
Buffers recent speech a very wicked
one. 1t says: If the American cor.
respondent of the Times has analysed
General Buffers recent speech to bis
Massachusetts constituents with any
approach to fairness-and his analysis
seems fair enough-a more wicked
speech was never uttered in a political
assembly. 1t is a deliberate attempt to
obtain popularity by risking war on a
totally inadequate ground. The fish.
cry question, whenever it arises between
nations, is as dangerous as the poach-
ing question is between classes, and for
precisely the same reason-namely,
that the mass of mankind never fairly
realize that sea-fsh or wild game are
property at ALL Nobody feeds them :;
nobody owns them; there is supposed to
be no end of them-though that is dam
gerous delusion-and everybody thinks
if he takes trouble to get them he has a
right to have them. AS in the proach-
ing dispute also, the popular feeling
about sea-fish comes right athwart a
very strict law. The fish caught with
in the three-mile limit belong to the
nation which owns the coast, and
which, therefore, can either keep the
fisheries to ITSELF or can, as most ma
tons do, sell licenses to fish This rule
would be sufficiently clear to enlist the
sympathies OF all owners of property,
but that there is dispute, never com
p.etely settled, as to the method Of
drawing the three-mile line. Is it to
be measured from low water mark, and
so follow all indentations of the coast =?
Or is all water included by a straight
line from headland to headland to be
considered without the three miles /?
Those who want to fish prefer
the more rigid, and those who
want to prevent fishing the
more ample measurement and both
parties contest the point with a feeling
that they are being violently oppressed,
and contemplate as the subject matter
Of quarrel is, are sure to be in tenn
per for fighting rather than arbitration.
As it happens, Massachusetts is espe-
cially angry just now. Many of her
citizens are fishermen; their favorite
banks. lie on the Canadian shore, and
they have lost nearly thirty vessels,
which have been seized and condemned
by the Canadians for trespassing within
the prescribed line. The Canadians are
probably in the right, and if not, the
matter is one to be submitted to a Judi
cial commission of the two countries !;
but General Butler, simply to make his
election, seizes upon it, makes infam-
matory speeches, declares that England
is robbing the people Of Massachusetts
of their fish, and calls on them to break
off all negotiations with the "unfriendly
government which is scheming, by
means of fish, to build up hos
tile nation north of the United
States" We must allow, Of course,
for the necessities Of oratory, and
for American delight in exaggera-
ton; but this man, who may be the
ieaGe.' md will certainly be one Of the
leaders OF MS ls-'y is clearly doing his
best to stir up discOrd pe.~san the two
most powerful maritime natious for his
selfish self-interest-is risking a war
which would be pure injury to the world,
and his own people, in order to secure
a triumphant election. He does not
care about a few trumpery cod any
more than the Englishmen do, but he
knows that men grow bitter on any sub
iect of the kind; and, as an English
demagogue risks exciting spirit of
agrarian outrage by nonsensical de-
clamation about hares, so General But.
Ter risks horrible war by declaring
that England is "scheming' to injure
the union by protecting cod.
We suppose there is no help for this
kind of thing, but we never can quite
get over a sense Of surprise that Ameri-
cans should tolerate it Massachusetts
claims to be, and is, the wisest State in
the Union. Her population is excep-
lionally cool, moderate, and well, edu-
Gated. She has set most commenda-
bic example of fidelity to her pecuniary
obligations, having paid interest on her
bonds in gold throughout the war, when
she was legally authorized to pay them
in paper. Yet her citizens hear with a
kind of pleasure that they ought to
make these bonds worthless, and attack
peaceful people, and risk and inflict un-
numbered evils because Great Britain is
trying to deprive them of a doubtful
right to fish in halfa-dozen bays for
cod; the whole worth of which would
be lost 10 the State in one days panic
about the war.