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OPINION OF CHANCELLOR KENT.

(Kent's Commentaries, I. 25.)

"It is well to be understood, at a period when alterations in the constitutions of governments, and revolutions in states, are familiar, that it is a clear position of the law of nations, that treaties are not affected, nor positive obligations of any kind with other powers, or with creditors, weakened, by any such mutations. A state neither loses any of its rights, nor is discharged from any of its duties, by a change in the form of its civil government. The body politic is still the same, though it may have a different organ of communication. So, if a state should be divided in respect to territory, its rights and obligations are not impaired; and if they have not been apportioned by special agreement, those rights are to be enjoyed, and those obligations fulfilled, by all the parts in common."

(b) Upon Private Rights.

THE UNITED STATES v. PERCHEMAN.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES, 1833.

(7 Peters, 51, 86.)

Juan Percheman claimed two thousand acres of land lying in the territory of Florida, by virtue of a grant of the Spanish governor of that province made in 1815. After Florida was ceded to the United States by the treaty of 1819, this claim was rejected by the United States commissioners appointed to settle claims to territory in Florida; and the question then came before the court for decision.

Held that title to private property in the soil is not affected by a cession of territory.

MARSHALL, C. J., delivered the opinion of the court, an extract from which is as follows:

So, in the case of the cession of Alsace and Lorraine to Germany in 1871, no part of the French national debt was assumed by Germany on their account. (Bluntschli: Droit International, Article 48.)

On the other hand, on the seizure of Schleswig-Holstein by Prussia, in 1866, the debt of Denmark was divided between that country and Schleswig-Holstein; "and in the same year, Italy, by convention with France, took upon itself so much of the Papal debt as was proportionate to the revenues of the Papal provinces which it had appropriated." (Hall's International Law, 3d ed., 102, note.)

"It may not be unworthy of remark that it is very unusual even in cases of conquest, for the conqueror to do more than to displace the sovereign and assume dominion over the country. The modern usage of nations, which has become law, would be violated; that sense of justice and of right which is acknowledged and felt by the whole civilized world would be outraged, if private property should be generally confiscated, and private rights annulled. The people change their allegiance; their relation to their ancient sovereign is dissolved; but their relations to each other, and their rights of property, remain undisturbed. If this be the modern rule even in cases of conquest, who can doubt its application to the case of an amicable cession of territory? Had Florida changed its sovereign by an act containing no stipulation respecting the property of individuals, the right of property in all those who became subjects or citizens of the new government would have been unaffected by the change. It would have remained the same as under the ancient sovereign. * * * "A cession of territory is never understood to be a cession of the property belonging to its inhabitants. The king cedes that only which belonged to him. Lands he had previously granted were not his to cede. Neither party could so understand the cession. Neither party could consider itself as attempting a wrong to individuals, condemned by the practice of the whole civilized world. The cession of a territory by its name from one sovereign to another, conveying the compound idea of surrendering at the same time the lands and the people who inhabit them, would be necessarily understood to pass the sovereignty only, and not to interfere with private property." 1

OPINION OF BAYARD, SECRETARY OF STATE.

DESPATCH TO ROBERTS, MARCH 20, 1886.

(1 Wharton's Digest, 16.)

In the territory conquered by Chili from Peru in the war of 1879-1882, citizens of the United States had acquired certain rights from the Peruvian government which, after the conquest, the Chilian government was inclined not to respect. In Mr. Bayard's opinion, rights of individuals acquired under a former govern. ment should be respected in the case even of conquest by another government.

"The decision now made rests on an alleged rule of international law which, assumed, as it now is, by the Government of Chili,

1 To the same effect in Mutual Ass. Society v. Watts, 1 Wheaton, 270, 282.

becomes a proper matter of discussion between ourselves and that Government. It is asserted by the Government of Chili (for, in international relations, and the maintenance of international duties, the action of the judiciary in Chili is to be treated, when assumed by the Government, as the act of the Government) that a sovereign, when occupying a conquered territory, has, by international law, the right to test titles acquired under his predecessor by applying to them his own municipal law, and not the municipal law of his predecessor under which they vested. **

"The Government of the United States, therefore, holds that titles derived from a duly constituted prior foreign Government to which it has succeeded are 'consecrated by the law of nations' ' even as against titles claimed under its own subsequent laws. The rights of a resident-neutral-having become fixed and vested by the law of the country-cannot be denied or injuriously affected by a change in the sovereignty or public control of that country by transfer to another Government. His remedies may be affected by the change of sovereignty, but his rights at the time of the change must be measured and determined by the law under which he acquired them. The Government of the United States is therefore prepared to insist on the continued validity of such titles, as held by citizens of the United States, when attacked by foreign Governments succeeding that by which they [were] granted. Title to land and landed improvements, is, by the law of nations, a continuous right, not subject to be divested by any retroactive legislation of new Governments taking the place of that by which such title was lawfully granted. Of course it is not intended here to deny the prerogative of a conqueror to confiscate for political offenses, or to withdraw franchises which by the law of nations can be withdrawn by Governments for the time being. Such prerogatives have been conceded by the United States as well as by other members of the family of nations by which international law is constituted. What, however, is here denied, is the right of any Government to declare titles lawfully granted by its predecessor to be vacated because they could not have been lawfully granted if its own law had, at the time in question, prevailed.

"This pretension strikes at that principle of historical municipal continuity of Governments which is at the basis of international law."

SECTION 7.-DE FACTO GOVERNMENTS.

(a) Recognition of Belligerency.

OPINION OF DANA.

(Dana's Edition of Wheaton, p. 34, note.)

"THE Occasion for the accordance of belligerent rights arises when a civil conflict exists within a foreign state. The reason which requires and which can alone justify this step by the government of another country, is, that its own rights and interests are so far affected as to require a definition of its own relations to the parties. Where a parent government is seeking to subdue an insurrection by municipal force, and the insurgents claim a political nationality and belligerent rights which the parent government does not concede, a recognition by a foreign state of full belligerent rights, if not justified by necessity, is a gratuitous demonstration of moral support to the rebellion, and of censure upon the parent government. But the situation of a foreign state with reference to the contest and the condition of affairs between the contending parties, may be such as to justify this act. It is important, therefore, to determine what state of affairs, and what relations of the foreign state, justify the recognition.

"It is certain that the state of things between the parent state and insurgents must amount in fact to a war, in the sense of international law, that is, powers and rights of war must be in actual exercise: otherwise the recognition is falsified, for the recognition is of a fact. The tests to determine the question are various, and far more decisive where there is maritime war and commercial relations with foreigners. * * *

"As to the relation of the foreign state to the contest, if it is solely on land, and the foreign state is not contiguous, it is difficult to imagine a call for the recognition. If, for instance, the United States should formally recognize belligerent rights of an insurgent community at the center of Europe, with no seaports, it would require a hardly supposable necessity to make it else than a mere demonstration of moral support. But a case may arise where a foreign state must decide whether to hold the parent state responsible

for acts done by the insurgents or to deal with the insurgents as a de facto government. (Mr. Canning to Lord Granville on the Greek War, June 22, 1826.) If the foreign state recognizes belligerency in the insurgents, it releases the parent state from responsibility for whatever may be done by the insurgents, or not done by the parent state, where the insurgent power extends. (Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward, June 11, 1861, Dip. Con. 105.) In a contest wholly upon land, a contiguous state may be obliged to make the decision whether or not to regard it as war; but, in practice this has not been done by a general and prospective declaration, but by actual treatment of cases as they arise. Where the insurgents and the parent state are maritime, and the foreign nation has extensive commercial relations and trade at the ports of both, and the foreign nation and either or both of the contending parties have considerable naval force, and the domestic contest must extend itself over the sea, then the relations of the foreign state to this contest are far different. In such a state of things, the liability to political complications, and the questions of right and duty to be decided at once, usually away from home, by private citizens or naval officers, seem to require an authoritative and general decision as to the status of the three parties involved. If the contest is a war, all foreign citizens and officers, whether executive or judicial, are to follow one line of conduct. If it is not a war, they are to follow a totally different line. If it is a war, the commissioned cruisers of both sides may stop, search and capture the foreign merchant-vessel; and that vessel must make no resistance, and must submit to adjudication by a prize court. If it is not a war, the cruisers of neither party can stop or search the foreign merchant-vessel; and that vessel may resist all attempts in that direction, and the ships of war of the foreign state may attack and capture any cruiser persisting in the attempt. If it is war, foreign nations must await the adjudication of prize tribunals. If it is not war, no such tribunal can be opened. If it is a war, the parent state may institute a blockade jure gentium of the insurgent ports, which foreigners must respect; but, if it is not a war, foreign nations having large commercial intercourse with the country, will not respect a closing of insurgent ports by paper decrees only. If it is a war, the insurgent cruisers are to be treated by foreign citizens and officials, at sea and in port, as lawful belligerents. If it is not a war, those cruisers are pirates, and may be treated as such. If it is a war, the rules and risks respecting carrying contraband, or despatches, or military persons come into play. If it is not a war, they do not. Within foreign jurisdiction, if it is a war, acts of the insurgents in the way of preparation and

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