Ter`ri*to"ri*al wa"ters. (Internat. Law)
The
waters under the territorial jurisdiction of a state; specif., the
belt (often called the marine belt or
territorial sea) of sea subject to such
jurisdiction, and subject only to the right of innocent passage by the
vessels of other states.
Perhaps it may be said without impropriety that a state
has theoretically the right to extend its territorial waters
from time to time at its will with the increased range of guns.
Whether it would in practice be judicious to do so . . . is a widely
different matter . . . . In any case the custom of regulating a line
three miles from land as defining the boundary of marginal
territorial waters is so far fixed that a state must be
supposed to accept it in absence of express notice.
W. E. Hall.
© Webster 1913.