in the Law

Grotius, the code of war has been vastly enlarged and improved,
and its rights better defined, and its severities greatly mitigated.
The rights of maritime capture, the principles of the law of prize,
and the duties and privileges of neutrals, have grown into very
important titles in the system of national law. We Modern im-
now appeal to more accurate, more authentic, more provements
precise, and more commanding evidence of the rules of of Nations.
public law, by a reference to the decisions of those tribunals, to
whom, in every country, the administration of that branch of
jurisprudence is specially intrusted. We likewise appeal to the
official documents and ordinances of particular states, which
have professed to reduce into a systematic code, for the direction
of their own tribunals, and for the information of foreign powers,
the law of nations, on those points which relate particularly to
the rights of commerce and the duties of neutrality. But in the
absence of higher and more authoritative sanctions, the ordi-
nances of foreign states, the opinions of eminent statesmen, and
the writings of distinguished jurists, are regarded as of great con-
sideration on questions not settled by conventional law. In cases
where the principal jurists agree, the presumption will be
very great in favor of the solidity of their maxims; and no 19
civilized nation, that does not arrogantly set all ordinary
law and justice at defiance, will venture to disregard the uniform
sense of the established writers on international law. England
and the United States have been equally disposed to acknowl-
edge the authority of the works of jurists, writing professedly on
public law, and the binding force of the general usage and
practice of nations, and the still greater respect due to judicial
decisions recognizing and enforcing the law of nations. In all
our foreign negotiations and domestic discussions of questions
of national law, we have paid the most implicit respect to the
practice of Europe, and the opinions of her most distinguished
civilians. Iu England, the report made in 1753, to the king, in
answer to the Prussian memorial, is very satisfactory evidence of
the obedience shown to the great standing authorities on the law
of nations, to which I have alluded. And in a case which came
before Lord Mansfield, in 1764, in the K. B., (a) he referred to

(a) Triquet v. Bath, 3 Burr. 1478.

a decision of Lord Talbot, who had declared that the law of nations was to be collected from the practice of different nations, and the authority of writers; and who had argued from such authorities as Grotius, Barbeyrac, Bynkershoek, Wicquefort, &c., in a case where British authority was silent. The most celebrated collections and codes of maritime law, such as the Consolato del Mare, the laws of Oleron, the laws of the Hanseatic league, and, above all, the marine ordinances of Louis XIV., are also referred to, as containing the most authentic evidence of the immemorial and customary law of Europe.

Importance The dignity and importance of this branch of jurisof the study prudence, cannot fail to recommend it to the deep attention of the student; and a thorough knowledge of its principles is necessary to lawyers and statesmen, and highly ornamental to every scholar who wishes to be adorned with the accomplishments of various learning. Many questions arise in

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the course of commercial transactions, which require for * their solution an accurate acquaintance with the conventional law of Europe, and the general doctrines of the prize tribunals. Though we may remain in peace, there is always war raging in some part of the globe, and we have at the present moment (a) neutral rights to exact, and neutral duties to perform, in the course of our Mediterranean trade, and in the trade to the Brazils, and along the shores of the Pacific. A comprehensive and scientific knowledge of international law is highly necessary, not only to lawyers practising in our commercial , ports, but to every gentleman who is animated by liberal views, and a generous ambition to assume stations of high public trust. It would be exceedingly to the discredit of any person who should be called to take a share in the councils of the nation, if he should be found deficient in the great leading principles of this law; and I think I cannot be mistaken in considering the elementary learning of the law of nations, as not only an essential part of the education of an American lawyer, but as proper to be academically taught. My object, therefore, in some succeeding lectures will be, to discuss all the leading points arising upon the rights and duties of nations, in the several relations of peace, of war, and of neutrality.

(a) November, 1824.

OF THE RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF NATIONS IN A STATE OF PEACE.

A VIEW of the rights and duties of nations in peace, will lead us to examine the grounds of national independence, the extent of territorial jurisdiction, the rights of embassy and of commercial intercourse.

Equality and independence of nations.

Nations are equal in respect to each other, and entitled to claim equal consideration for their rights, whatever may be their relative dimensions or strength, or however greatly they may differ in government, religion, or manners. This perfect equality, and entire independence of all distinct states, is a fundamental principle of public law. It is a necessary consequence of this equality, that each nation has a right to govern itself as it may think proper, and no one nation is entitled to dictate a form of government, or religion, or a course of internal policy, to another. No state is entitled to take cognizance or notice of the domestic administration of another state, or of what passes within it as between the government and its own subjects. (a) The Spaniards, as Vattel▾

(a) Grotius, de Jure belli et pacis, b. 1, c. 3, sec. 8. Vattel, Droit des Gens, b. 2, c. 4, sec. 54. Rutherforth's Inst. b. 2, c. 9. The principle of non-interference with the internal policy and government of other states, was emphatically declared by England and France in the autumn of 1830, and new strength and solidity were thereby given to national freedom and independence. But the right of intervention exists when impending danger requires it, as when it is necessary to prevent aggression by preventing the dangerous accumulation of the means of attack. An interference to preserve the balance of power among neighboring nations, is another case of the utmost moment and difficulty, and requires the most grave and comprehensive consideration. Such intervention has, within the last two centuries, been very frequent, and led to extensive and destructive wars. But it was necessary and just in some of the instances, and preeminently so with England, in 1803, and with Austria, in 1813, under the dangerous preponderance and inveterate aggressions of France. "No governments," said

1

observes, violated all rules of right, when they set up a tribunal of their own to judge the Inca of Peru according to their *22 laws. If he had broken the law of nations in respect to them, they would have had a right to punish him; but when they undertook to judge of the merits of his own interior administration, and to try and punish him for acts committed in the course of it, they were guilty of the grossest injustice. No nation had a contention within itself, but the ancient Romans, with their usual insolence, immediately interfered, and with profound duplicity pretended to take part with the oppressed for the sake of justice, though in reality for the purpose of dominion. It was by a violation of the right of national independence, that they artfully dissolved the Achæan league, and decreed that each member of the confederacy should be governed by its own laws, independent of the general authority. (a) But so surprisingly loose and inaccurate were the theories of the ancients on the subject of national independence, that the Greeks seem never to have questioned the right of one state to interfere in the internal concerns of another. (b) We have several instances within time of memory, of unwarrantable and flagrant violations of the independence of nations. The interference of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, in the internal government of Poland, and first dismembering it of large portions of its territory, and then finally overturning its constitution, and destroying its existence as an independent power, was an aggravated abuse of national right. There were several cases which preceded, or which arose during the violence of the French revolution, which were unjustifiable invasions of the rights of independent nations to prescribe their own forms of government, and to deal in their discretion with their own domestic concerns. Among other instances, we may refer to the

General Washington, (Sparks's Writings of Washington, vol. xi. p. 382,) “ought to interfere with the internal concerns of another, except for the security of what is due to themselves." War may be engaged in, in behalf of our neighbors, if it be very certain that we must suffer by their ruin. Tua res agitur, paries quum proximus ardet. Heinecc. Elem. Jur. Nat. et Gent. b. 2, c. 9, sec. 107.

(a) Livy, b. 33, c. 30. Florus, b. 2, c. 7. Montesq. Consid. sur les Causes de la Grand. des Rom. c. 6.

(b) Mitford's Hist. of Greece, vol. v. 127.

invasion of Holland by the Prussian arms in 1787, and of
France by the Prussian arms in 1792, and of wars fomented or
declared against all monarchical forms of government, by
the French rulers, during the early and more intemperate *23
stages of their revolution. We may cite also the invasion
of Naples by Austria in 1821, and the invasion of Spain by
France in 1823, under the pretext of putting down a dangerous
spirit of internal revolution and reform, as instances of the
same violation of the absolute equality and independence of
nations. (a)

(a) The British government declined being a party to the promulgated doctrines and proceedings of the congress of the great powers of continental Europe at Troppau and Laybach, in 1821, and at Verona, in 1822, and which gave sanction to the invasions of Naples and Spain. It was not supposed by Great Britain that there existed in either of those instances, a case of such direct and imminent danger to the safety of other states, as to warrant, upon principles of international law, a forcible interference. The allied sovereigns who assembled at Laybach and Verona, do not appear to have differed essentially with Great Britain, as to the general principles which ought to regulate the interference of other states in the internal affairs of Naples and Spain, but they differed in the application of those principles to the cases before them. They justified their interference on the ground that it was necessary for protecting Italy from a general insurrection, and the neighboring states from the most imminent dangers," "that there existed a vast conspiracy against all established power and against all those rights consecrated by that social order under which Europe had enjoyed so many centuries of glory and happiness."-"That, in respecting the rights and independence of all legitimate power, they regarded as disavowed by the principles which constitute the public right of Europe, all pretended reform operated by revolt and open hostility." Their object was to protect the peace of Europe "against those disastrous attempts which would spread the horror of universal anarchy over the civilized world" - "against a fanaticism for innovation, which would soon have rendered the existence of any public order whatever, problematical." That they were far from wishing to prolong this interference beyond the limits of strict necessity, and would ever prescribe to themselves the preservation of the independence and of the rights of each state." Circular Despatch and Declaration of the Sovereigns of Austria, Russia, and Prussia; Laybach, May, 1821. Annual Register for 1821, p. 599. The quadruple alliance in 1834, between France, Spain, Great Britain, and Portugal, was made for the purpose of putting an end to a war in regard to the succession to the crown of Portugal, waged between the Emperor Don Pedro, contending for the rights of the Queen of Portugal, Donna Maria 2d, and the Infante Don Miguel, who had usurped the throne, and also, for the purpose of expelling from the Peninsula the Infante Don Carlos, who disputed with Queen Isabella 2d the succession to the crown of Spain, and is another instance of interference with the internal concerns of nations. The object of the interference and quadruple alliance was effected by the expulsion of the two Infantes. So far, the armed interference in this case went on the momentous questions of dynasty and succession, and on the pretence of putting an end to a destructive and interminable civil war.