a guano deposit, and which was not within the lawful jurisdiction of any other Government, and not occupied by citizens of any other Government.

(3) On the high seas.-5339. Every person who commits murderFirst, within any fort, arsenal, dock-yard, magazine, etc., under the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States;

Second, or upon the high seas, etc., within the maritime jurisdiction of the United States and out of the jurisdiction of any particular state;

Third, or who upon any such waters maliciously strikes, stabs, wounds, poisons, or shoots at any person, of which such person dies, shall suffer death.

Nearly the whole Chapter III (sections 5339-5391) deals with "crimes arising within the maritime jurisdiction;" but section 5344, dealing with officers or owners of vessels, through whose misconduct, negligence, etc., life is lost, is not confined to the maritime jurisdiction of the United States as defined by section 5339; though sections 5341, 5342, and 5345 are expressly referred to section 5339; and the same, as with section 5344, is the case with sections 5363-5367.

(b) As to the nature of offenses. (Offenses against international law.)— Offenses and crimes against international law are embraced by the criminal statutes of the United States Revised Statutes, according to the Constitution of the United States, Art. I, sec. 8, which bestows on Congress the power to legislate on crimes against international law. Such legislation (on piracy, etc.) we find in sections 5323-24 and 5368–276. (c) As to persons (subjects abroad).-Section 5382 deals with citizens voluntarily on board a foreign slave-trade vessel. Fine not more than $2,000, and imprisonment not more than two years.

Section 5331. Every person owing allegiance to the United States, who levies war against them, or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason.

"Every person owing allegiance" means those non-citizens, too, who declared on oath to become citizens, and to have renounced allegiance to their former sovereign.

Section 5335. Citizens' intercourse with foreign Government to the intended detriment of the Government of the United States, is punishable. "Every citizen of the United States, whether actually residing or abiding within the same or in a foreign country," etc.

(3) On mutual consent.

Section 1750. Every secretary of legation and consular officer is hereby authorized to administer to or take from an person an oath, affirmation, affidavit, or deposition. If any person shall willfully and corruptly commit perjury, such offender may be charged, proceeded

against, tried, and convicted, and dealt with in any district of the United States, as if such offense had been committed in the United States.

This statute, evidently emanating from the extraterritoriality of legacy, is the strongest proof of the fact that the United States, in certain cases, assumed the right of extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction. Though the person of the consular officer be not, like the secretary of legation, entitled to extraterritorial rights, the seal of the state, held by him, makes those abusing it by perjury or forgery, indictable extraterritorially.

From these quotations it will appear that President Cleveland gravely mistook in declaring that "no such practice or doctrine (that is to say, extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction) was ever known to the laws of this country."

CHAPTER III.

FRENCH AND GERMAN LEGISLATION ON FOREIGNERS' FOREIGN OFFENSES AGAINST THE STATE.

A.-TEXT OF THE MAIN LAWS.

1.-FRENCH LAW.

Section 7 of the French "Code d'Instruction Criminelle" (Code of Criminal Proceedings) reads as follows:

A foreigner, who in a foreign country shall commit, either as a main culprit or as an accomplice, a crime against the safety of the state or the crime of counterfeiting either the seal of the state or national money or national certificates or bank notes issued under the authority of the law, shall be prosecuted or tried according to the provisions of French law, should that person be arrested in or surrendered to France.

2.-GERMAN LAW.

Section 4 of the "Strafgesetzbuch für das Deutsche Reich" (Penal Code of the German Empire) reads as follows:

Crimes and offenses committed in a foreign country shall, as a rule, not be prosecuted.

But there may be prosecuted, according to the Penal Code of the German Empire:

(1) A German or a foreigner who, in a foreign country, committed-
(a) An act of high treason against the German Empire or a
Federal State, or

(b) The crime of counterfeiting, or who

(c) As an official of the German Empire (or of a Federal State) committed an act that is to be considered an offense of an officer while on duty.

(2) A German who, in a foreign country committed an act treacherous to the German Empire (or a Federal State) or a slander or libel against a German Federal Sovereign.

(3) A German who, in a foreign country, committed an act punishable according to the laws of both Germany and that foreign place of commission.

B.-SYNOPSIS OF THE FRENCH AND GERMAN LAWS.

On extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction of foreigners' foreign acts comprises:

1.-FRENCH AND GERMAN LAWS ON FOREIGNERS' FOREIGN POLITICAL OFFENSES

(a) French law.

France punishes foreign crimes against the safety of the state (see p. 25). Those crimes are defined in the "Code Pénal" (criminal code) section 75 seq., and divided into "crimes against the exterior safety of the state (sections 75-85), and “crimes against the interior safety of the state" (section 86 seq.). We shall deal with them in the next chapter (IV).

(b) German law.

Germany, to the contrary, punishes only foreigners' foreign acts of high treason; that is to say, only crimes against the interior safety of the state. An "act of high treason" means in German law "Hochverrath," while crimes against the exterior safety of the state are termed in German law "Landesverrath" (acts treacherous to the country). The latter crime, if committed abroad, is punished only if perpetrated by a German (see p. 26, and sections 4-2 of the German Penal Code). The reason thereof we shall see later. But though Germany exempts foreigners' foreign "treacherous acts to the country" from punishment in general, she reserves to herself the right to deal in another way with such foreigners' foreign "acts treacherous to the country," as warrant the usage of war to take effect, dispensing with the ordinary law, as we shall see below.

German law on "high treason" is defined by sections 80-86, and German law on "acts treacherous to the country," by sections 87-93 of the German Penal Code.

II.-FRENCH AND GERMAN LAW ON FOREIGNERS' FOREIGN COUNTERFEITING.

(a) General distinctions.

France punishes foreigners' foreign counterfeiting

(a) The seal of the state.

(6) Lawful French money.

Germany punishes foreigners' foreign counterfeiting whatever money, not only German one; this was expressly declared by the preamble to the German Penal Code, page 15. The reason of that declaration is rather clear; the citizens of the state might be defrauded with counterfeited foreign money as well as with counterfeited German money. Germany thus extends her extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction not only to crimes intended to take effect in Germany, but even to such as might, perhaps, touch Germany in their effect.

(b) Position of the United States towards those laws.

Counterfeiting the seal of the French state comes, in some way, under the general provisions against falsifying documents, with intent to defraud the United States (section 3422, Revised Statutes of the United States). Counterfeiting foreign money was provided for, as well as counterfeiting domestic money, by penal statutes of the United States. In either case of counterfeiting, committed within the United States, our Government can justly claim their privilege of priority of jurisdiction, should an American citizen be held for trial in France or Germany for counterfeiting committed in this country.

Moreover, counterfeiting is provided for by most of the extradition treaties, and such is the case as to the treaties of the United States with France and Germany.

In general may be said: As to the extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction assumed by France and Germany over the crime of counterfeiting, the question of "privilege of priority of jurisdiction," if raised by the United States, probably never will lead to any difficulty, because in punishing counterfeiting all governments are interested alike.

III.-GERMAN LAW ON FOREIGNERS' FOREIGN OFFICIAL OFFENSES.

Germany sometimes intrusts foreigners, to wit, natives of Germany, living in distant foreign countries, with official or officious business. To deny, from principle, the right of extraterritorial criminal jurisdiction in such case would be destructive of all righteousness of intercourse between nations, while conceding such jurisdiction might intricate the Government of this country in serious difficulties, because of the difference of opinions as to the foundation of the indictment.

The only way of obviating such collisions is not to accept at all any official business, any commission from a foreign government, except services of charity, warranted by the interest of humanity, as, for instance, the assumption of officious protection of foreigners being left unprotected after necessary departure of the diplomatic representant of their country,

It would be of great profit to forbid by law to American citizens the acceptance of any foreign official or officious business or commission except of a commission of charity, and that only under consent by our Secretary of State.