Belgium for the punishment of such acts, but a project of a law on the subject was then introduced in the parliament.

Mr. Tree, min. to Belgium, to Mr. Bayard, Sec. of State, March 30, 1888, and May 11, 1888, For. Rel. 1888, I. 41, 42.

5. QUESTION AS TO RUNNING WATER,

§ 226.

For a discussion of this question, in the case of the Rio Grande and the Rio Colorado, see supra, §132.

A party doing an injury in one State of the United States to a water power running into another State, may be proceeded against in civil suit in either State in which he may be served with process; though proceedings in rem, by way of injunction or indictment to compel abatement, can only be brought in the jurisdiction in which the nuisance exists.

See 6 Crim. Law Mag. 169; Stillman v. Man. Co., 3 Wood. and M. 538;
Foot v. Edwards, 2 Blatch. 310; Miss. and Mo. R. R. v. Ward, 2
Black, 485; Wooster r. Man. Co., 31 Me. 246; In re Eldred, 46 Wis.
530; Thayer v. Brooks, 17 Ohio, 489; Armendiaz v. Stillman, 54
Tex. 623.

April 12, 1895, the Secretary of the Interior communicated to the Department of State certain papers concerning the reported intention of a dyke company, which afterwards became known in the correspondence as the Alberta and British Columbia Exploration Company, a corporation of British Columbia, to dam Boundary Creek where it crosses the boundary line, the result of which would be the overflow and washing away of the lands and improvement of settlers in the State of Idaho. The papers were communicated to the British ambassador April 17, 1895, with a request that if on investigation the facts were found to be as stated, suitable measures might be taken to avert the threatened injury. Jan. 19, 1897, other papers were communicated to the ambassador, showing that the apprehended injury had been done; the course of the creek having been so changed as to overflow all the low-lying portion of township 65 north range, West Boise meridian, causing destruction of pasturage, hay, improvements, and cattle, and compelling settlers to abandon their homesteads. A request for an investigation was again made, in order that, if the facts were found to be as stated, prompt measures might be taken for the removal of the obstruction in the creek, and the payment of proper indemnity to those who had been injured by the proceedings of the company. The subject was again brought to the ambassador's attention June 9, 1897. It appears that the Canadian government sent an officer to make an investigation, and that for a time work on

the dyke was stopped; but the company afterwards resumed operations, raising and strengthening the dyke. This condition of things was brought to the notice of the British embassy Aug. 10, 1897. The embassy, Oct. 1, 1897, stated that the authorities of British Columbia would be instructed to make full and proper inquiry into the complaint of the landowners, but that Her Majesty's Government were advised that the complainants had a right of action in the courts of British Columbia, and that they would be entitled to sue for damages and for an injunction against the continuance of the mischief. The settlers, it seems, engaged a lawyer, who found that it was impossible to do anything for them individually, as the land damaged belonged to the United States; " and they therefore asked the United States Government to take up the matter for them in the British Columbian courts.

Mr. Sherman, Sec. of State, to Sec. of Interior, Jan. 31, 1898, 225 MS.
Dom. Let. 77.

VII. LANDING OF SUBMARINE CABLES.

$ 227.

Regulation of landing.

"On May 4, 1897, the French ambassador submitted to your Department the application of the French Company of Telegraphic Cables (the successor of La Compagnie Française du Télégraphe de Paris à New-York') for permission to land a cable supplementary to that which it has between Brest and Cape Cod, upon the same terms and conditions as those which were imposed by the President in 1879, when the original cable was landed.

"On May 11, 1897, your Department replied to this request, saying: "The present Executive does not regard himself as clothed, in the absence of legislative enactment, with the requisite authority to take any action upon the application which you present. A bill was introduced in the last Congress giving the President of the United States express authority to authorize the landing of submarine cables on the shore of the United States subject to conditions therein specified, but it failed to become a law. Until Congress shall see fit to clothe the President with power to act in matters of this kind, he will be compelled to refrain from doing so."

"On June 4, 1897, your Department addressed a note to the French ambassador, calling his attention to the fact that it had been represented to the Department that a steamer from France had arrived at Cape Cod with the avowed purpose of laying the shore end of the new cable, and saying:

"It is the expectation of the Federal Government that that company (the French Cable Company) will take no steps toward laying its proposed cable from Cape Cod without express authorization of the President or of Congress, before which, as I have observed to you, a bill was introduced at the last session, but which has not yet been enacted into law. If that company should, however, take action in the manner proposed, it is proper to say that it would do so at its peril.'

"On June 5, 1897, another note was sent, informing the French ambassador of advices received to the effect that about 1,000 feet of the new French cable had been laid at Cape Cod the day before, and saying:

"Before taking any further action in the matter, I request that you will promptly instruct the proper authorities of the French Telegraph Company, in case the Department's information should be correct, to immediately desist from its work, pending the necessary authorization of the President or of Congress.

"The French ambassador's notes, two of the 5th and one each of the 6th and 8th of June, disclose the fact that, although the Department's notes of the 4th and 5th of June had been promptly forwarded to the company's agent, the work of landing the cable had been completed before their receipt.

"In view of the situation outlined, and the fact that Congress has not acted upon the matter, you request an official expression of my views as to the power of the President, in the absence of legislative enactment, to control the landing of foreign telegraphic cables.

"What the President can do and ought to do in the case of projected cables may possibly be ascertained from what he has done; at any rate, a recurrence to the history of the landing of certain existing cables may prove of service in considering the question you propound.

"The first cable from a foreign country landed upon the shores of the United States was one connecting the island of Cuba with the State of Florida, and was landed in 1867, under supposed authority of the act of Congress of May 5, 1866 (14 Stat., 44), granting to the International Ocean Telegraph Company, a New York corporation, the sole privilege, for fourteen years, of laying and operating telegraphic cables from the shores of Florida to Cuba, the Bahamas, and other West India islands, upon these conditions, namely, the United States to have the free use of the cable for military, naval, and diplomatic purposes; the company to keep all its lines open to the public for the daily publication of market and commercial reports and intelligence; all messages to be forwarded in the order received; no charge to exceed $3.50 for messages of ten words, and Congress to have the power to alter and determine the rates. (Forty-ninth Congress, sec

ond session, Senate Doc. No. 122, p. 63; letter of Mr. Freylinghuysen to the President, January 27, 1885.)

"In 1869 a concession was granted by the French Government to a company which proposed to lay a cable from the shores of France to the United States. One of the provisions of this concession gave to the company for a long period the exclusive right of telegraphic communication by submarine cable between France and the United States. President Grant resisted the landing of the cable unless this offensive monopoly feature should be abandoned. The French company accordingly renounced the exclusive privilege, and the President's objection was withdrawn. The cable was laid in July, 1869; it ran from Brest, France, to St. Pierre, a French island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, thence to Duxbury, Mass., and was known as the First French Cable.' It soon passed, however, into the control of the Anglo-American Company, controlling the cables connecting Great Britain with this continent. (Senate Doc. No. 122, pp. 63, 71.) a

"In a note respecting this cable, dated July 10, 1869, and addressed to the French and British ministers, Mr. Fish said:

"It is not doubted by this Government that the complete control of the whole subject, both of the permission and the regulation of this mode of foreign intercourse, is with the Government of the United States, and that, however suitable certain legislation on the part of a State of the Union may become, in respect to its proprietary rights, in aid of such enterprises, the entire question of the allowance or prohibition of such means of foreign intercourse, commercial and political, and of the terms and conditions and its allowance, is under the control of the Government of the United States.' (Sen. Doc. No. 122, p. 65.)

"In his annual message of December, 1875, President Grant recounts his action respecting the French cable of 1869, and says:

"The right to control the conditions for the laying of a cable within the jurisdictional waters of the United States, to connect our shores with those of any foreign state, pertains exclusively to the Government of the United States, under such limitations and conditions as Congress may impose. In the absence of legislation by Congress, I was unwilling, on the one hand, to yield to a foreign state the right to say that its grantees might land on our shores while it denied a similar right to our people to land on its shore; and, on the other hand, I was reluctant to deny to the great interests of the world and of civilization the facilities of such communication as were proposed. I therefore withheld any resistance to the landing of the cable, on condition that the offensive monopoly feature of

a See also H. Ex. Doc. 46, 47th Cong. 2 sess., parts 1 and 2; S. Ex. Doc. 51, 48th Cong. 2 sess; 22 Stat. 173, 371.

the concession be abandoned, and that the right of any cable which may be established by authority of this Government to land upon French territory and to connect with French land lines, and enjoy all the necessary facilities or privileges incident to the use thereof upon as favorable terms as any other company, be conceded.' (Senate Doc. No. 122, p. 70.)

"After adverting to the need of new cables in order to provide competition and reduce rates, President Grant continues:

"As these cable-telegraph lines connect separate states, there are questions as to their organization and control which probably can be best, if not solely, settled by conventions between the respective states. In the absence, however, of international conventions on the subject, municipal legislation may secure many points which appear to me important, if not indispensable, for the protection of the public against the extortions which may result from a monopoly of the right of operating cable telegrams, or from a combination between several lines:

"I. No line should be allowed to land on the shores of the United States under the concession from another power which does not admit the right of any other line or lines formed in the United States to land and freely connect with and operate through its land lines.

"II. No line should be allowed to land on the shores of the United States which is not, by treaty stipulation with the Government from whose shores it proceeds, or by prohibition in its charter, or otherwise to the satisfaction of this Government, prohibited from consolidating or amalgamating with any other cable-telegraph line, or combining therewith for the purpose of regulating and maintaining the cost of telegraphing.

"III. All lines should be bound to give precedence in the transmission of the official messages of the Governments of the two countries between which it may be laid.

"IV. A power should be reserved to the two Governments, either conjointly or to each, as regards the messages dispatched from its shores, to fix a limit to the charges to be demanded for the transmission of messages.

"I present this subject to the earnest consideration of Congress. "In the meantime, and unless Congress otherwise direct, I shall not oppose the landing of any telegraphic cable which complies with and assents to the points above enumerated, but will feel it my duty to prevent the landing of any which does not conform to the first and second points as stated, and which will not stipulate to concede to this Government the precedence in the transmission of its official messages, and will not enter into a satisfactory arrangement with regard to its charges.' (Senate Doc. No. 122, pp. 71-72.)