Bering Sea for a money compensation; and a reciprocity treaty
covering natural products and some manufactures was sketched out.
Yet no agreement followed. One issue, the Alaska boundary, proved
insoluble, and as no agreement was acceptable which did not cover
every difference, the Commission never again assembled after its
adjournment in February, 1899.


The boundary between Alaska and the Dominion was the only bit of
the border line not yet determined. As in former cases of
boundary disputes, the inaccuracies of map makers, the
ambiguities of diplomats, the clash of local interests, and
stiff-necked national pride made a settlement difficult. In 1825
Russia and Great Britain had signed a treaty which granted Russia
a long panhandle strip down the Pacific coast. With the purchase
of Alaska in 1867 the United States succeeded to Russia's claim.
With the growth of settlement in Canada this long barrier down
half of her Pacific coast was found to be irksome. Attempt after
attempt to have the line determined only added to the stock of
memorials in official pigeonholes. Then came the discovery of
gold in the Klondike in 1896, and the question of easy access by
sea to the Canadian back country became an urgent one. Canada
offered to compromise, admitting the American title to the chief
ports on Lynn Canal, Dyea and Skagway, if Pyramid Harbor were
held Canadian. She urged arbitration on the model the United
States had dictated in the Venezuela dispute. But the United
States was in possession of the most important points. Its people
believed the Canadian claims had been trumped up when the
Klondike fields were opened. The Puget Sound cities wanted no
breach in their monopoly of the supply trade to the north. The