foreigners at first were without rights, and a prey to violence, as having no share in political bodies. Hence they needed and fell under the protection of the seigneur, or of his bailiff. In France especially, the seigneur, as the price of his protection, levied a poll-tax on the stranger, and arrogated the right to inherit his goods when he had no natural heirs within the district. Even the capacity of making a testament was taken away from him, and sometimes even inland heirs were excluded from the succession. Some lords forbade strangers to leave the district after a certain length of residence, and to marry out of it. And sometimes these rights were exercised over Frenchmen from other juristic territories (chatellenies), under the same suzerains. The name by which this right or aggregate of rights went is jus albinagii, droit d'aubaine, which M. Dietz, the highest authority in Romanic philology, derives not from Albanus, a Scotchman, nor from alibi natus, but from alibi simply, formed from the adverb, after the analogy of prochain, lointain.

At length the droit d'aubaine fell to the king alone, and now consisted first in an extraordinary tax levied upon strangers on certain occasions, and secondly in the king's becoming the heir of strangers who had left no heirs of their body within the kingdom. Many private persons were exempted from the operation of this right by special privilege, and whole nations, as the United States in 1778, by treaty. Abolished by the constituent assembly in 1790, and re-established by the code Napoleon on the principle of reciprocity, it again disappeared anew from French legislation in 1819, when a law gave to foreigners the right of succession in France to the same extent with native-born Frenchmen.1

$ 64.

Certain classes of aliens are, by the comity of nations, exempted in a greater or less degree from the control of the Exterritoriality. laws, in the land of their temporary sojourn. They are conceived of as bringing their native laws with them out of their native territory, and the name given to the fiction of lawfor it seems there must be a fiction of law to explain a very simple fact is exterritoriality. This privilege is conceded especially (1.) to sovereigns travelling abroad with their trains; (2.) to ambassadors, their suite, family, and servants; and (3.) to the officers and crews of public armed vessels in foreign ports, and to armies in their permitted transit through foreign territory.

This privilege is not constant, nor unlimited. The right of Limits of exter- entrance into foreign territory, on which the priritoriality. vilege is founded, is one dependent on a comity which

1 See especially Warnkönig, Französ. Rechtsgesch. ii. 180-188, 471, and De Martens, i. § 90.

As to sovereigns,

Ships of war,

circumstances may abridge. Thus, for reasons of state, a sovereign may have the permission refused to him to set foot on a foreign soil, and much more is the like true of ships and armies. When a sovereign is abroad, his person is inviolate and exempt from the laws of the land, but he may not exercise acts of sovereignty not accorded to him by his native laws, as, for instance, that of punishing persons in his suite capitally- -as Queen Christina of Sweden put to death one of her household in France-nor acts hazardous to the safety or sovereignty of the state where he is sojourning, nor, perhaps, acts which the sovereign of the country himself cannot exercise. Neither then nor at any time will this right apply so as to exempt real or other property, which he may have in the foreign country, from its local laws, with the exception of such effects as he may have brought with him. For the same right as conceded to ambassadors, we refer to the chapter relating to those functionaries. Ships of war and vessels chartered to convey a sovereign or his representative, are peculiar in this respect, that the vessel is regarded in a certain sense to be part of alien territory moved into the harbours of another state. (§ 54.) The crews on board the public vessels are under their native laws, but on shore, if guilty of acts of aggression or hostility, can be opposed by force and arrested. So also the vessel itself must pay respect to the port and health laws.1 Crimes committed on shore expose persons belonging to such vessels not only to complaint before their own sovereign, but also to arrest and trial. Of armies in transit, when such a right Armies in is conceded, Vattel says (iii. 8, § 130) that the transit, grant of passage includes that of every particular thing connected with the passage of troops, and of things without which it would not be practicable—such as the liberty of carrying whatever may be necessary to an army; that of exercising military discipline on the officers and soldiers; and that of buying at a reasonable rate anything an army may want, unless a fear of scarcity renders an exception necessary, when the army must carry with them their provisions.' If we are not deceived, crimes committed along the line of march, away from the body of the army, as pilfering and marauding, authorise arrest by the magistrates of the country, and a demand at least that the commanding officers shall bring such crimes to a speedy trial. When the transit of troops is allowed, it is apt to be specially guarded by treaties.

The crews of commercial vessels in foreign ports have in general no such exemption from the law of the place. Crews of comBy the law of France, however, crimes committed mercial vessels on board of foreign vessels in French ports, where in French ports.

none but the crew are concerned, are not considered as pertaining to the jurisdiction of the courts of France, while offences committed on the shore and against others than the vessels' crews, come before the tribunals of the kingdom. This is a compromise between territorial sovereignty and the principle or fiction that the ship is a part of the domain of its own nation, wherever found. Vessels driven into foreign waters against the will of the master, are exempted from ordinary harbours out of charges and jurisdiction, and allowed to depart un

Vessels driven into foreign

their course.

Exemptions to foreigners in

countries.

hindered.1

$ 65.

Exemption from local jurisdiction has been granted to foreigners from Christian lands, resident in certain oriental countries; the reasons for which lie in the fact that certain Eastern the laws and usages there prevailing are quite unlike those of Christendom, and in the natural suspicion of Christian states that justice will not be administered by the native courts, which leads them to obtain special privileges for their subjects. The arrangements for this purpose are contained in treaties which have a general resemblance to one another. In Turkey and some other Mohammedan countries, foreigners form communities under their consuls, who exercise over them a jurisdiction, both in civil and criminal matters, which excludes that of the territorial courts. In civil cases an appeal lies to the courts at home, and in criminal, beyond the imposition of fines, the consul has power only to prepare a case for trial before the same tribunals. But the extent of power given to its functionaries each nation determines for itself.

The same system in general has been followed in the treaties of Christian states with China, of which that made by the United States in 1844, and spoken of below under the title of consuls, may serve as an example. Quite recently the same exterritorial jurisdiction has been granted by the government of Japan to functionaries of the United States resident in that country.3

1 Compare Heffter, § 79, and Webster's Letter to Ashburton respecting the 'Creole,' Works, vi. 303-313.

2 Wheaton, El. ii. 2, § 11.

3 An Act was passed by Congress, in 1860, to carry into effect certain stipulations in the treaties between the United States and China, Japan, Siam, Turkey, Persia, Tripoli, Tunis, Morocco, and Muscat, and by which our laws in criminal and civil matters are extended over American citizens in those countries; also the common law, including equity and admiralty. Ministers and consuls have full judicial powers, and can punish by fine or imprisonment, or both, at discretion. The President is authorised to appoint seven marshals to execute processes, one in Japan, four in China, one in Siam, and one in Turkey. Murder and insurrection, or rebellion against the government of either of said countries, with intent to subvert the same, are made capital offences, punishable with death. Our consuls or commercial agents on islands not inhabited by any civilised people, or whom we have not recognised by treaty, are also empowered to exercise judicial functions over

§ 66.

Foreign residents in most Christian countries can sustain, in the course of time, a closer or more distant connec- Aliens losing in tion with the body politic within whose borders they the character of part or entirely live. They can acquire nationality, or in other words aliens. become naturalised, or they may remain in the territory as domiciliated strangers.

Naturalisation.

Naturalisation implies the renunciation of a former nationality, and the fact of entrance into a similar relation towards a new body politic. It is possible for a person, without renouncing his country, or expatriating himself, to have the privileges of citizenship in a second country, although he cannot sustain the same obligations to both. Is it also possible for him to renounce his country, and become a citizen of another, so far as even to be bound, like his fellow-citizens, to take up arms against the land of his birth? Most nations hold that this transfer of allegiance is possible, and embody the conditions of it in their naturalisation laws. Even England, which retains the doctrine of indelible allegiance, admits strangers to citizenship by special act or grant. (§ 66, infra.) But inasmuch as the conditions of naturalisation vary, there may arise here a conflict of laws, and two nations may at once claim the same man as sustaining to them the obligations of a citizen. International law has not undertaken to decide in such conflicts, and the question is scarcely one of practical importance, except when the naturalised person returns to his native country, and when he is caught fighting against her. There is no doubt that a state, having undertaken to adopt a stranger, is bound to protect him like any other citizen. Should he return to his native soil, and be apprehended for the non-fulfilment of civic duties which devolved on him before his emigration, there would be no ground of complaint on that score. Should he be required anew to enter into the status of a citizen, this force must be regarded by his adopted country, on her theory of civic rights, as a wrong calling for redress. Should he be subjected to ill-treatment when a captive in war, on the ground of fighting against his native country, here, too, there would be reason for retaliation. In short, the nation which has naturalised, and thus bound itself to protect a person, cannot abandon its obligation, on account of views of civic obligations which another nation may entertain. (Note 3.)

Whether anything short of completed naturalisation can sunder

American citizens. By the treaty with Japan, signed at Yedo July 29, 1858, offences shall be tried in the offender's court and according to the law of his country, and the courts of each nation, that is, the consular and the Japanese, are open to creditors belonging to the other nationality.

the tie to the place of origin, may be a question. It is held that a domiciled stranger may not with impunity be found in arms against his native country. For the effects of incipient naturalisation, compare the case of Koszta in the appendix to this chapter. The English practice in the earlier part of this century, of impressing seamen from neutral vessels, on the ground that they owed allegiance to their native sovereign, was objectionable, whether this doctrine of inalienable allegiance stands or falls; for to seize sailors on foreign vessels is to act the sovereign out of one's own territory; it is to execute one's own laws where the laws of another sovereign are supreme. (Compare § 202.)

We add here the regulations of some of the more important countries in regard to naturalisation.2

Rules of several nations as to

In England it was formerly granted only by act naturalisation. of parliament; but by a statute of 1844, one of the principal secretaries of state can, on petition from an alien desirous of being naturalised, grant him all the capacities and rights of a natural-born British subject, except the capacity of being a member of the privy council or a member of either house of parliament. The secretary may except other rights also. (Phillimore, i. § 354.)

In France a stranger becomes a citizen when, after reaching the age of twenty-one, obtaining liberty of domicil, and declaring his intention to remain in France, he resides there for ten consecutive years. His naturalisation must also be pronounced to be in force by the head of the state. In addition to this the child of foreign parents, born on French soil, may claim the quality of a Frenchman in the year succeeding his majority. Naturalisation in a foreign country involves the loss of French citizenship.3

In Prussia an appointment to a public function brings the right of citizenship with it, and the same is the case in Austria, and perhaps elsewhere. In Prussia the higher administrative authorities have the right to naturalise strangers of good character who possess the means of subsistence, excepting Jews, subjects of other members of the Germanic confederacy, and persons incapable of taking care of themselves.

În Austria leave to exercise a profession, ten years of residence, and the consent of the authorities, are pre-requisites to naturalisation.

In both of the last-named states nationality is shaken off by emigration, for which permission has been obtained from the government.

1 Kent, i. 76, Lect. iv.

2 Fœlix (Droit International Privé, 3rd ed.) i. 81-100. 2 Deniangeat on Fœlix, i. 88, gives the latest legislation on this subject. The term of ten years can be reduced to one in favour of inventors and others who confer important services on France.