Their decision was in accordance with the principle for which the United States had contended, though not following the actual line which it had sketched.

It gave the Americans, however, full control of the coast and its harbors, and the settlement provided a mutually accepted boundary on every frontier.
With the discovery of gold in the far North, Alaska began a period of development which is rapidly making that territory an important economic factor in American life.

Today the time when this vast northern coast was valuable only as the breeding ground for the fur seal seems long past.

Nevertheless the fur seal continued to be sought, and for years the international difficulty of protecting the fisheries remained.
Finally, in 1911, the United States entered into a joint agreement with Great Britain, Japan, and Russia, which is actually serving as a sort of international game law.

The problems of Alaska that remain are therefore those of internal development.
Diplomacy, however, is not concerned solely with sensational episodes.
American ministers and the State Department are engaged for the most part in the humdrum adjustment of minor differences which never find their way into the newspapers.