itself, failed to mark that distinction between civil rights and criminal wrongs, which was the very essense of the international rule."

After observing that, in the opinion of the Judicial Committee, the first passage above quoted from Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U. S. 265, 290, "disclosed the proper test for ascertaining whether an action was penal within the meaning of the rule," he added: "A proceeding, in order to come within the scope of the rule, must be in the nature of a suit in favor of the State whose law had been infringed. All the provisions of municipal statutes for the regulation of trade and trading companies were presumably enacted in the interest and for the benefit of the community at large; and persons who violated those provisions were, in a certain sense, offenders against the state law as well as against individuals who might be injured by their misconduct. But foreign tribunals did not regard those violations of statute law as offences against the State, unless their vindication rested with the State itself or with the Community which it represented. Penalties might be attached to them, but that circumstance would not bring them within the rule, except in cases where those penalties were recoverable at the instance of the State, or of an official duly authorized to prosecute on its behalf, or of a member of the public in the character of a common informer. An action by the latter was regarded as an actio popularis pursued, not in his individual interest, but in the interest of the whole community."

He had already, in an earlier part of the opinion, observed: "Their lordships could not assent to the proposition that, in considering whether the present action was penal in such sense as to oust their jurisdiction, the courts of Ontario were bound to pay absolute deference to any interpretation which might have been put upon the statute of 1875 in the State of New York. They had to construe and apply an international rule, which was a matter of law entirely within the cognizance of the foreign court whose jurisdiction was invoked. Judicial decisions in the State where the cause of action arose were not precedents which must be followed, although the reasoning upon which they were. founded must always receive careful consideration and might be conclusive. The court appealed to must determine for itself, in

the first place, the substance of the right sought to be enforced, and, in the second place, whether its enforcement would, either directly or indirectly, involve the execution of the penal law of another State. Were any other principle to guide its decision, a court might find itself in the position of giving effect in one case, and denying effect in another, to suits of the same character, in consequence of the causes of action having arisen in different countries; or in the predicament or being constrained to give effect to laws which were, in its own judgment, strictly penal."

In this view that the question is not one of local, but of international law, we fully concur. The test is not by what name the statute is called by the legislature or the courts of the State in which it was passed, but whether it appears to the tribunal which is called upon to enforce it to be, in its essential character and effect, a punishment of an offence against the public, or a grant of a civil right to a private person.

In this country, the question of international law must be de termined in the first instance by the court, state or national, in which the suit is brought. If the suit is brought in a Circuit Court of the United States, it is one of those questions of general jurisprudence which that court must decide for itself, uncontrolled by local decisions. Burgess v. Seligman, 107 U. S. 20, 33; Texas & Pacific Railway v. Cox, 145 U. S. 593, 605, above cited. If a suit on the original liability under the statute of one State is brought in a court of another State, the Constitution and laws of the United States have not authorized its decision upon such a question to be reviewed by this court. New York Ins. Co. v. Hendren, 92, U. S. 286; Roth v. Ehman, 107 U. S. 319. But if the original liability has passed into judgment in one State, the courts of another State, when asked to enforce it, are bound by the Constitution and laws of the United States to give full faith and credit to that judgment, and if they do not, their decision, as said at the outset of this opinion, may be reviewed and reversed by this court on writ of error. The essential nature and real foundation of a cause of action, indeed, are not changed by recovering judgment upon it. This was directly adjudged in Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., above cited. The difference is only in

the appellate jurisdiction of this court in the one case or in the other.

If a suit to enforce a judgment rendered in one State, and which has not changed the essential nature of the liability, is brought in the courts of another State, this court, in order to determine, on writ of error, whether the highest court of the latter State has given full faith and credit to the judgment, must determine for itself whether the original cause of action is penal in the international sense. The case, in this regard, is analogous to one arising under the clause of the Constitution which forbids a State to pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts, in which, if the highest court of a State decides nothing but the original construction and obligation of a contract, this court has no jurisdiction to review its decision; but if the state court gives effect to a subsequent law, which is impugned as impairing the obligation of a contract, this court has power, in order to determine whether any contract has been impaired, to decide for itself what the true construction of the contract is. New Orleans Waterworks v. Louisiana Sugar Co., 125 U. S. 18, 38. So if the state court, in an action to enforce the original liability under the law of another State, passes upon the nature of that liability and nothing else, this court cannot review its decision; but if the state court declines to give full faith and credit to a judgment of another State, because of its opinion as to the nature of the cause of action on which the judgment was recovered, this court, in determining whether full faith and credit have been given to that judgment, must decide for itself the nature of the original liability.

Whether the Court of Appeals of Maryland gave full faith and credit to the judgment recovered by this plaintiff in New York depends upon the true construction of the provisions of the Constitution and of the act of Congress upon that subject.

The provision of the Constitution is as follows: "Full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records and judicial proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof." Art. 4, sect. I.

This clause of the Constitution, like the less perfect provision on the subject in the Articles of Confederation, as observed by Mr. Justice Story, "was intended to give the same conclusive effect to judgments of all the States, so as to promote uniformity, as well as certainty, in the rule among them;" and had three dis tinct objects: first, to declare, and by its own force establish, that full faith and credit should be given to the judgments of every other State; second, to authorize Congress to prescribe the manner of authenticating them; and third, to authorize Congress to prescribe their effect when so authenticated. Story on the Con stitution, §§ 1307, 1308.

Congress, in the exercise of the power so conferred, besides prescribing the manner in which the records and judicial proceedings of any State may be authenticated, has defined the effect thereof, by enacting that "the said records and judicial proceedings, so authenticated, shall have such faith and credit given to them in every court within the United States, as they have by law or usage in the courts of the State from which they are taken." Rev. Stat. § 905, re-enacting Act of May 26, 1790, c. II, I Sta*.

122.

These provisions of the Constitution and laws of the United States are necessarily to be read in the light of some established principles, which they were not intended to overthrow. They give no effect to judgments of a court which had no jurisdiction of the subject-matter or of the parties. D'Arcy v. Ketchum, II How. 165; Thompson v. Whitman, 18 Wall. 457. And they confer no new jurisdiction on the courts of any State; and therefore do not authorize them to take jurisdiction of a suit or prosecution of such a penal nature, that it cannot, on settled rules of public and international law, be entertained by the judiciary of any other State than that in which the penalty was incurred. Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., above cited.

Nor do these provisions put the judgments of other States upon the footing of domestic judgments, to be enforced by execution; but they leave the manner in which they may be enforced to the law of the State in which they are sued on, pleaded, or offered in evidence. McElmoyle v. Cohen, 13 Pet. 312, 325. But when

duly pleaded and proved in a court of that State, they have the effect of being not merely prima facie evidence, but conclusive proof, of the rights thereby adjudicated; and a refusal to give them the force and effect, in this respect, which they had in the State in which they were rendered, denies to the party a right secured to him by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Christmas v. Russell, 5 Wall. 290; Green v. Van Buskirk, 5 Wall. 307, and 7 Wall. 139; Insurance Co. v. Harris, 97 U. S. 331, 336; Crescent City Co. v. Butchers' Union, 120 U. S. 141, 146, 147; Carpenter v. Strange, 141 U. S. 87.

The judgment rendered by a court of the State of New York, now in question, is not impugned for any want of jurisdiction ii. that court. The statute under which that judgment was recovered was not, for the reasons already stated at length, a penal law in the international sense. The faith and credit, force and effect, which that judgment had by law and usage in New York was to be conclusive evidence of a direct civil liability from the individual defendant to the individual plaintiff for a certain sum of money, and a debt of record, on which an action would lie, as on any other civil judgment inter partes. The Court of Appeals of Maryland, therefore, in deciding this case against the plaintiff, upon the ground that the judgment was not one which it was bound in any manner to enforce, denied to the judgment the full faith, credit and effect to which it was entitled under the Constitution and laws of the United States.

Judgment reversed, and case remanded to the Court of Ap peals of the State of Maryland for further proceedings not inconsistent with the opinion of this court.

STATUS OF MARRIAGE.

VAN VOORHIS v. BRINTNALL, 86 N. Y. 18, (1881).

DANFORTH, J. By this action the plaintiffs seek a construction of the will of Elias W. Van Voorhis deceased, and an adjudication as to the right under it of the defendant, Rose Van Voorhis. The questions turn upon these facts: The testator died it. 1869, leaving a widow and three children, Elias, Sarah and