proved, that the State of a foreigner can demand reparation at the hands of the Government of his country; and it is not till after the Executive as well as the Judicial Authorities have refused redress, that recourse can be had to Reprisals (j), much less to War.

As a general rule, no objection to the forms of procedure or the mode of administering justice in the Courts of the country, can found any such demand: the foreigner should have considered these things before he entered into transactions in the country (k). Nevertheless, a plain violation of the substance of natural justice, e.g. refusing to hear the party or to allow him to call witnesses, would amount to the same thing as an absolute denial of justice.

"Jus repressalium " (says Grotius) " fieri intelligitur non "tantum si in sontem aut debitorem judicium intra tempus "idoneum obtineri nequeat, verum etiam si in re minime dubia

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(nam in dubia re præsumptio est pro his qui ad judicia "publice electi sunt) plane contra jus judicatum sit; nam "auctoritas judicantis non idem in exteros quod in subditos “valet. . . exteri autem jus habent cogendi, sed quo uti non "liceat quamdiu per judicium suum possint obtinere" (1).

It is impossible to state the law more ably or more clearly than in the reply of Great Britain, in 1753, to the King of Prussia (m). According to that statement, “The law of "nations, founded upon justice, equity, convenience, and "the reason of the thing, and confirmed by long usage, does "not allow of reprisals, except in cases of violent injuries "directed or supported by the State; and justice absolutely "denied in re minime dubia by all the tribunals, and after"wards by the Prince" (n).

() Vide post, vol. iii.

(k) See the case of Mr. Worth-Papers laid before Parliament 1871. (1) Grotius, 1. iii. c. ii. s. 5.

(m) 2 Martens, Causes célèbres, part i.

P. 57 of Memorial.-Cabinet Library of Scarce and Celebrated Tracts, vol. i.

(n) Treaty between England and Holland, July 31, 1667. Reprisals not

IV. The distinction between domiciled persons and visitors in or passengers through a foreign country is never to be lost sight of; because it must affect the application of the rule of law which empowers a nation to enforce the claims of its subjects in a foreign State. The foreign domicil does not indeed necessarily take away this rule of law, but it renders the invocation of it less reasonable, and the execution of it more difficult.

A subject, who has deliberately domiciled himself in another State, can have no ground of complaint, if he be subjected to many taxes and impositions from which the simple stranger would, by the usage of nations, be exempt. Moreover he must be taken to have considered the habits of the people, the laws of the country, and their mode of administration, before he established therein his household gods, and made it the principal seat of his fortunes. He cannot therefore expect, that every complaint which, with respect to these matters, he may be disposed to urge upon his native Government, will of necessity be entertained by it. More especially, if, being permitted by the law of his domicil, he have purchased land, and thus incorporated himself, as it were, into the territory of a foreign country, he cannot require his native Government to interfere on the subject of the operation of municipal laws, or the judgment of municipal tribunals upon his rights of immovable property in this foreign land.

The case must be one of flagrant violation of justice, which would lay the foundation of an International remonstrance in such a matter; unless, indeed, the provisions of some particular treaty (o), or some public proclamation of the foreign Government, take the case out of the application of the general law.

Grotius takes this distinction very strongly between the

to be granted till Justice has been demanded according to the ordinary course of law.

(0) See next Chapter.

actually domiciled and the merely commorant foreigner, in his discussion on the important question upon which we are now about to enter, viz. as to the liability of the nation at large for the obligations incurred by their Government.—“ Jure "gentium subjacent pignorationi omnes subditi injuriam "facientis, qui tales sunt ex causa permanente, sive indigenæ, "sive advenæ : non qui transeundi aut moræ exiguæ causa "alicubi sunt" (p).

Recent times have furnished some striking examples of armed intervention of States on behalf of injured subjects.

The Convention in 1861 between England, France, and Spain, led to the combined expedition to Mexico, in order to enforce the payment of debts due from that State to their subjects, and for the general redress of injuries to them (q).

The war of 1868, waged by England against Abyssinia, for the imprisonment and detention of British subjects—a war very remarkable for the skill and vigour with which it was conducted, and the complete success which crowned it (r).

The exigencies of war may sometimes compel a belligerent to make immediate use of the property of subjects of neutral States commorant in his territory: in such cases, he must prove the overwhelming necessity which led to the act, and make, as soon as practicable, full compensation to the injured person. The conduct pursued by the Prussian Government with respect to the seizure of British vessels in the Seine by the Prussian army during the recent war with France, most fully recognised, and most amply discharged, these international obligations (s).

(8) See Correspondence (laid before Parliament 1871) respecting the sinking of six British vessels in the Seine by Prussian troops.

CHAPTER III.

RIGHT OF PROTECTING CITIZENS IN FOREIGN
COUNTRIES.-DEBTS OF THE STATE.

V. THE right of interference on the part of a State, for the purpose of enforcing the performance of justice to its citizens from a foreign State, stands upon an unquestionable foundation, when the foreign State has become itself the debtor of these citizens.

It must, of course, be assumed that such State has, through the medium of its proper and legitimate organs, contracted such debt; whether that organ be the Sovereign alone according to the Constitution of Russia, or the Sovereign and Parliament, according to the Constitution of England, the debt so contracted with foreign citizens, whether in an individual or a corporate capacity, constitutes an obligation, of which the country of the lenders has a right to require and enforce the fulfilment. Whether it will exercise that right or not is a matter for the consideration of its private domestic policy: "Les emprunts," Vattel says, with great precision (a), "faits pour le service de l'Etat, les dettes "créés dans l'administration des affaires publiques, sont des "contrats de droit étroit, obligatoires pour l'Etat et la nation "entière. Rien ne peut la dispenser d'acquitter ces dettes

(a) Vattel, 1. ii. c. xiv. s. 216.

Cod. 1. xi. t. 29. de jure Reipublicæ. "An respublica, in cujus locum successistis, ideo, quia satisfecisse debito vos proponitis, jus pignoris in eo fundo habeat, apud suum judicem quæritur. Si enim neque beneficio sibi concesso id jus nacta est, neque specialiter in obligatione pignoris sibi prospexit, causa ejus non separatur a ceteris creditoribus, qui habent personalem actionem."