Commentaries on the Laws of England Part 20

[Footnote w: Finch. L. 82.]

[Footnote x: Co. Litt. 43.]

[Footnote y: The methods of appointing this guardian or regent have been so various, and the duration of his power so uncertain, that from thence alone it may be collected that his office is unknown to the common law; and therefore (as sir Edward c.o.ke says, 4 Inst. 58.) the surest way is to have him made by authority of the great council in parliament. The earl of Pembroke by his own authority a.s.sumed, in very troublesome times, the regency of Henry III, who was then only nine years old; but was declared of full age by the pope at seventeen, confirmed the great charter at eighteen, and took upon him the administration of the government at twenty. A guardian and council of regency were named for Edward III, by the parliament which deposed his father; the young king being then fifteen, and not a.s.suming the government till three years after. When Richard II succeeded at the age of eleven, the duke of Lancaster took upon him the management of the kingdom, till the parliament met, which appointed a nominal council to a.s.sist him. Henry V on his death-bed named a regent and a guardian for his infant son Henry VI, then nine months old: but the parliament altered his disposition, and appointed a protector and council, with a special limited authority. Both these princes remained in a state of pupillage till the age of twenty three. Edward V, at the age of thirteen, was recommended by his father to the care of the duke of Glocester; who was declared protector by the privy council. The statutes 25 Hen. VIII. c. 12. and 28 Hen. VIII. c. 7. provided, that the successor, if a male and under eighteen, or if a female and under sixteen, should be till such age in the governance of his or her natural mother, (if approved by the king) and such other counsellors as his majesty should by will or otherwise appoint: and he accordingly appointed his sixteen executors to have the government of his son, Edward VI, and the kingdom; which executors elected the earl of Hertford protector. The statute 24 Geo. II. c. 24. in case the crown should descend to any of the children of Frederick late prince of Wales under the age of eighteen, appoints the princess dowager;--and that of 5 Geo. III. c. 27. in case of a like descent to any of his present majesty's children, empowers the king to name either the queen, the princess dowager, or any descendant of king George II residing in this kingdom;--to be guardian and regent, till the successor attains such age, a.s.sisted by a council of regency: the powers of them all being expressly defined and set down in the several acts.]

III. A THIRD attribute of the king's majesty is his _perpetuity_. The law ascribes to him, in his political capacity, an absolute immortality. The king never dies. Henry, Edward, or George may die; but the king survives them all. For immediately upon the decease of the reigning prince in his natural capacity, his kings.h.i.+p or imperial dignity, by act of law, without any _interregnum_ or interval, is vested at once in his heir; who is, _eo instanti_, king to all intents and purposes. And so tender is the law of supposing even a possibility of his death, that his natural dissolution is generally called his _demise_; _dimissio regis, vel coronae_: an expression which signifies merely a transfer of property; for, as is observed in Plowden[z], when we say the demise of the crown, we mean only that in consequence of the disunion of the king's body natural from his body politic, the kingdom is transferred or demised to his successor; and so the royal dignity remains perpetual. Thus too, when Edward the fourth, in the tenth year of his reign, was driven from his throne for a few months by the house of Lancaster, this temporary transfer of his dignity was denominated his _demise_; and all process was held to be discontinued, as upon a natural death of the king[a].

[Footnote z: Plowd. 177. 234.]

[Footnote a: M. 49 Hen. VI. pl. 1-8.]

WE are next to consider those branches of the royal prerogative, which invest this our sovereign lord, thus all-perfect and immortal in his kingly capacity, with a number of authorities and powers; in the exertion whereof consists the executive part of government. This is wisely placed in a single hand by the British const.i.tution, for the sake of unanimity, strength and dispatch. Were it placed in many hands, it would be subject to many wills: many wills, if disunited and drawing different ways, create weakness in a government: and to unite those several wills, and reduce them to one, is a work of more time and delay than the exigencies of state will afford. The king of England is therefore not only the chief, but properly the sole, magistrate of the nation; all others acting by commission from, and in due subordination to him: in like manner as, upon the great revolution in the Roman state, all the powers of the antient magistracy of the commonwealth were concentred in the new emperor; so that, as Gravina[b] expresses it, "_in ejus unius persona veteris reipublicae vis atque majestas per c.u.mulatas magistratuum potestates exprimebatur_."

[Footnote b: _Orig._ 1. --. 105.]

AFTER what has been premised in this chapter, I shall not (I trust) be considered as an advocate for arbitrary power, when I lay it down as a principle, that in the exertion of lawful prerogative, the king is and ought to be absolute; that is, so far absolute, that there is no legal authority that can either delay or resist him. He may reject what bills, may make what treaties, may coin what money, may create what peers, may pardon what offences he pleases: unless where the const.i.tution hath expressly, or by evident consequence, laid down some exception or boundary; declaring, that thus far the prerogative shall go and no farther. For otherwise the power of the crown would indeed be but a name and a shadow, insufficient for the ends of government, if, where it's jurisdiction is clearly established and allowed, any man or body of men were permitted to disobey it, in the ordinary course of law: I say, in the _ordinary_ course of law; for I do not now speak of those _extraordinary_ recourses to first principles, which are necessary when the contracts of society are in danger of dissolution, and the law proves too weak a defence against the violence of fraud or oppression. And yet the want of attending to this obvious distinction has occasioned these doctrines, of absolute power in the prince and of national resistance by the people, to be much misunderstood and perverted by the advocates for slavery on the one hand, and the demagogues of faction on the other. The former, observing the absolute sovereignty and transcendent dominion of the crown laid down (as it certainly is) most strongly and emphatically in our lawbooks, as well as our homilies, have denied that any case can be excepted from so general and positive a rule; forgetting how impossible it is, in any practical system of laws, to point out beforehand those eccentrical remedies, which the sudden emergence of national distress may dictate, and which that alone can justify. On the other hand, over-zealous republicans, feeling the absurdity of unlimited pa.s.sive obedience, have fancifully (or sometimes factiously) gone over to the other extreme: and, because resistance is justifiable to the person of the prince when the being of the state is endangered, and the public voice proclaims such resistance necessary, they have therefore allowed to every individual the right of determining this expedience, and of employing private force to resist even private oppression. A doctrine productive of anarchy, and (in consequence) equally fatal to civil liberty as tyranny itself. For civil liberty, rightly understood, consists in protecting the rights of individuals by the united force of society: society cannot be maintained, and of course can exert no protection, without obedience to some sovereign power: and obedience is an empty name, if every individual has a right to decide how far he himself shall obey.

IN the exertion therefore of those prerogatives, which the law has given him, the king is irresistible and absolute, according to the forms of the const.i.tution. And yet, if the consequence of that exertion be manifestly to the grievance or dishonour of the kingdom, the parliament will call his advisers to a just and severe account.

For prerogative consisting (as Mr Locke[c] has well defined it) in the discretionary power of acting for the public good, where the positive laws are silent, if that discretionary power be abused to the public detriment, such prerogative is exerted in an unconst.i.tutional manner.

Thus the king may make a treaty with a foreign state, which shall irrevocably bind the nation; and yet, when such treaties have been judged pernicious, impeachments have pursued those ministers, by whose agency or advice they were concluded.

[Footnote c: on Gov. 2. --. 166.]

THE prerogatives of the crown (in the sense under which we are now considering them) respect either this nation's intercourse with foreign nations, or it's own domestic government and civil polity.

WITH regard to foreign concerns, the king is the delegate or representative of his people. It is impossible that the individuals of a state, in their collective capacity, can transact the affairs of that state with another community equally numerous as themselves.

Unanimity must be wanting to their measures, and strength to the execution of their counsels. In the king therefore, as in a center, all the rays of his people are united, and form by that union a consistency, splendor, and power, that make him feared and respected by foreign potentates; who would scruple to enter into any engagements, that must afterwards be revised and ratified by a popular a.s.sembly. What is done by the royal authority, with regard to foreign powers, is the act of the whole nation: what is done without the king's concurrence is the act only of private men. And so far is this point carried by our law, that it hath been held[d], that should all the subjects of England make war with a king in league with the king of England, without the royal a.s.sent, such war is no breach of the league. And, by the statute 2 Hen. V. c. 6. any subject committing acts of hostility upon any nation in league with the king, was declared to be guilty of high treason: and, though that act was repealed by the statute 20 Hen. VI. c. 11. so far as relates to the making this offence high treason, yet still it remains a very great offence against the law of nations, and punishable by our laws, either capitally or otherwise, according to the circ.u.mstances of the case.

[Footnote d: 4 Inst. 152.]

I. THE king therefore, considered as the representative of his people, has the sole power of sending emba.s.sadors to foreign states, and receiving emba.s.sadors at home. This may lead us into a short enquiry, how far the munic.i.p.al laws of England intermeddle with or protect the rights of these messengers from one potentate to another, whom we call emba.s.sadors.

THE rights, the powers, the duties, and the privileges of emba.s.sadors are determined by the law of nature and nations, and not by any munic.i.p.al const.i.tutions. For, as they represent the persons of their respective masters, who owe no subjection to any laws but those of their own country, their actions are not subject to the control of the private law of that state, wherein they are appointed to reside. He that is subject to the coercion of laws is necessarily dependent on that power by whom those laws were made: but an emba.s.sador ought to be independent of every power, except that by which he is sent; and of consequence ought not to be subject to the mere munic.i.p.al laws of that nation, wherein he is to exercise his functions. If he grossly offends, or makes an ill use of his character, he may be sent home and accused before his master[e]; who is bound either to do justice upon him, or avow himself the accomplice of his crimes[f]. But there is great dispute among the writers on the laws of nations, whether this exemption of emba.s.sadors extends to all crimes, as well natural as positive; or whether it only extends to such as are _mala prohibita_, as coining, and not to those that are _mala in se_, as murder[g]. Our law seems to have formerly taken in the restriction, as well as the general exemption. For it has been held, both by our common lawyers and civilians[h], that an emba.s.sador is privileged by the law of nature and nations; and yet, if he commits any offence against the law of reason and nature, he shall lose his privilege[i]: and that therefore, if an emba.s.sador conspires the death of the king in whose land he is, he may be condemned and executed for treason; but if he commits any other species of treason, it is otherwise, and he must be sent to his own kingdom[k]. And these positions seem to be built upon good appearance of reason. For since, as we have formerly shewn, all munic.i.p.al laws act in subordination to the primary law of nature, and, where they annex a punishment to natural crimes, are only declaratory of and auxiliary to that law; therefore to this natural, universal rule of justice emba.s.sadors, as well as other men, are subject in all countries; and of consequence it is reasonable that wherever they transgress it, there they shall be liable to make atonement[l]. But, however these principles might formerly obtain, the general practice of Europe seems now to have adopted the sentiments of the learned Grotius, that the security of emba.s.sadors is of more importance than the punishment of a particular crime[m]. And therefore few, if any, examples have happened within a century past, where an emba.s.sador has been punished for any offence, however atrocious in it's nature.

[Footnote e: As was done with count Gyllenberg the Swedish minister to Great Britain, _A.D._ 1716.]

[Footnote f: Sp. L. 26. 21.]

[Footnote g: Van Leeuwen _in Ff._ 50. 7. 17. Barbeyrac's Puff. l. 8.

c. 9. --. 9. & 17. Van Bynkershoek _de foro legator._ c. 17, 18, 19.]

[Footnote h: 1 Roll. Rep. 175. 3 Bulstr. 27.]

[Footnote i: 4 Inst. 153.]

[Footnote k: 1 Roll. Rep. 185.]

[Footnote l: Foster's reports. 188.]

[Footnote m: _Securitas legatorum utilitati quae ex poena est praeponderat._ _de jur. b. & p._ 2. 18. 4. 4.]

IN respect to civil suits, all the foreign jurists agree, that neither an emba.s.sador, nor any of his train or _comites_, can be prosecuted for any debt or contract in the courts of that kingdom wherein he is sent to reside. Yet sir Edward c.o.ke maintains, that, if an emba.s.sador make a contract which is good _jure gentium_, he shall answer for it here[n]. And the truth is, we find no traces in our lawbooks of allowing any privilege to emba.s.sadors or their domestics, even in civil suits, previous to the reign of queen Anne; when an emba.s.sador from Peter the great, czar of Muscovy, was actually arrested and taken out of his coach in London, in 1708, for debts which he had there contracted. This the czar resented very highly, and demanded (we are told) that the officers who made the arrest should be punished with death. But the queen (to the amazement of that despotic court) directed her minister to inform him, "that the law of England had not yet protected emba.s.sadors from the payment of their lawful debts; that therefore the arrest was no offence by the laws; and that she could inflict no punishment upon any, the meanest, of her subjects, unless warranted by the law of the land[o]." To satisfy however the clamours of the foreign ministers (who made it a common cause) as well as to appease the wrath of Peter[p], a new statute was enacted by parliament[q], reciting the arrest which had been made, "in contempt of the protection granted by her majesty, contrary to the law of nations, and in prejudice of the rights and privileges, which emba.s.sadors and other public ministers have at all times been thereby possessed of, and ought to be kept sacred and inviolable:" wherefore it enacts, that for the future all process whereby the person of any emba.s.sador, or of his domestic or domestic servant, may be arrested, or his goods distreined or seised, shall be utterly null and void; and the persons prosecuting, soliciting, or executing such process shall be deemed violaters of the law of nations, and disturbers of the public repose; and shall suffer such penalties and corporal punishment as the lord chancellor and the two chief justices, or any two of them, shall think fit. But it is expressly provided, that no trader, within the description of the bankrupt laws, who shall be in the service of any emba.s.sador, shall be privileged or protected by this act; nor shall any one be punished for arresting an emba.s.sador's servant, unless his name be registred with the secretary of state, and by him transmitted to the sheriffs of London and Middles.e.x. Exceptions, that are strictly conformable to the rights of emba.s.sadors[r], as observed in the most civilized countries. And, in consequence of this statute, thus enforcing the law of nations, these privileges are now usually allowed in the courts of common law[s].

[Footnote n: 4 Inst. 153.]

[Footnote o: Mod. Un. Hist. x.x.xv. 454.]

[Footnote p: A copy of the act made upon this occasion, very elegantly engrossed and illuminated, was sent him to Moscow as a present.]

[Footnote q: 7 Ann. c. 12.]

[Footnote r: _Saepe quaesitum est an comitum numero et jure habendi sunt, qui legatum comitantur, non ut instructior fiat legatio, sed unice ut lucro suo consulant, inst.i.tores forte et mercatores. Et, quamvis hos saepe defenderint et comitum loco habere voluerint legati, apparet tamen satis eo non pertinere, qui in legati legationisve officio non sunt. Quum autem ea res nonnunquam turbas dederit, optimo exemplo in quibusdam aulis olim receptum fuit, ut legatus teneretur exhibere nomenclaturam comitum suorum._ Van Bynkersh. _c._ 15. _prope finem_.]

[Footnote s: Fitzg. 200. Stra. 797.]

II. IT is also the king's prerogative to make treaties, leagues, and alliances with foreign states and princes. For it is by the law of nations essential to the goodness of a league, that it be made by the sovereign power[t]; and then it is binding upon the whole community: and in England the sovereign power, _quoad hoc_, is vested in the person of the king. Whatever contracts therefore he engages in, no other power in the kingdom can legally delay, resist, or annul. And yet, lest this plenitude of authority should be abused to the detriment of the public, the const.i.tution (as was hinted before) hath here interposed a check, by the means of parliamentary impeachment, for the punishment of such ministers as advise or conclude any treaty, which shall afterwards be judged to derogate from the honour and interest of the nation.

[Footnote t: Puff. L. of N. b. 8. c. 9. --. 6.]

III. UPON the same principle the king has also the sole prerogative of making war and peace. For it is held by all the writers on the law of nature and nations, that the right of making war, which by nature subsisted in every individual, is given up by all private persons that enter into society, and is vested in the sovereign power[u]: and this right is given up not only by individuals, but even by the intire body of people, that are under the dominion of a sovereign. It would indeed be extremely improper, that any number of subjects should have the power of binding the supreme magistrate, and putting him against his will in a state of war. Whatever hostilities therefore may be committed by private citizens, the state ought not to be affected thereby; unless that should justify their proceedings, and thereby become partner in the guilt. Such unauthorized voluntiers in violence are not ranked among open enemies, but are treated like pirates and robbers: according to that rule of the civil law[w]; _hostes hi sunt qui n.o.bis, aut quibus nos, publice bellum decrevimus: caeteri latrones aut praedones sunt_. And the reason which is given by Grotius[x], why according to the law of nations a denunciation of war ought always to precede the actual commencement of hostilities, is not so much that the enemy may be put upon his guard, (which is matter rather of magnanimity than right) but that it may be certainly clear that the war is not undertaken by private persons, but by the will of the whole community; whose right of willing is in this case transferred to the supreme magistrate by the fundamental laws of society. So that, in order to make a war completely effectual, it is necessary with us in England that it be publicly declared and duly proclaimed by the king's authority; and, then, all parts of both the contending nations, from the highest to the lowest, are bound by it. And, wherever the right resides of beginning a national war, there also must reside the right of ending it, or the power of making peace. And the same check of parliamentary impeachment, for improper or inglorious conduct, in beginning, conducting, or concluding a national war, is in general sufficient to restrain the ministers of the crown from a wanton or injurious exertion of this great prerogative.

[Footnote u: Puff. l. 8. c. 6. --. 8. and Barbeyr. _in loc._]

[Footnote w: _Ff._ 50. 16. 118.]

[Footnote x: _de jur. b. & p._ _l._ 3. _c._ 3. --. 11.]

IV. BUT, as the delay of making war may sometimes be detrimental to individuals who have suffered by depredations from foreign potentates, our laws have in some respect armed the subject with powers to impel the prerogative; by directing the ministers of the crown to issue letters of marque and reprisal upon due demand: the prerogative of granting which is nearly related to, and plainly derived from, that other of making war; this being indeed only an incomplete state of hostilities, and generally ending in a formal denunciation of war.

These letters are grantable by the law of nations[y], whenever the subjects of one state are oppressed and injured by those of another; and justice is denied by that state to which the oppressor belongs. In this case letters of marque and reprisal (words in themselves synonimous and signifying a taking in return) may be obtained, in order to seise the bodies or goods of the subjects of the offending state, until satisfaction be made, wherever they happen to be found.

Indeed this custom of reprisals seems dictated by nature herself; and accordingly we find in the most antient times very notable instances of it[z]. But here the necessity is obvious of calling in the sovereign power, to determine when reprisals may be made; else every private sufferer would be a judge in his own cause. And, in pursuance of this principle, it is with us declared by the statute 4 Hen. V. c.

7. that, if any subjects of the realm are oppressed in time of truce by any foreigners, the king will grant marque in due form, to all that feel themselves grieved. Which form is thus directed to be observed: the sufferer must first apply to the lord privy-seal, and he shall make out letters of request under the privy seal; and, if, after such request of satisfaction made, the party required do not within convenient time make due satisfaction or rest.i.tution to the party grieved, the lord chancellor shall make him out letters of marque under the great seal; and by virtue of these he may attack and seise the property of the aggressor nation, without hazard of being condemned as a robber or pirate.

[Footnote y: Grot. _de jur. b. & p._ _l._ 3. _c._ 2. --. 4 & 5.]

[Footnote z: See the account given by Nestor, in the eleventh book of the Iliad, of the reprisals made by himself on the Epeian nation; from whom he took a mult.i.tude of cattle, as a satisfaction for a prize won at the Elian games by his father Neleus, and for debts due to many private subjects of the Pylian kingdom: out of which booty the king took three hundred head of cattle for his own demand, and the rest were equitably divided among the other creditors.]

V. UPON exactly the same reason stands the prerogative of granting safe-conducts, without which by the law of nations no member of one society has a right to intrude into another. And therefore Puffendorf very justly resolves[a], that it is left in the power of all states, to take such measures about the admission of strangers, as they think convenient; those being ever excepted who are driven on the coasts by necessity, or by any cause that deserves pity or compa.s.sion. Great tenderness is shewn by our laws, not only to foreigners in distress (as will appear when we come to speak of s.h.i.+pwrecks) but with regard also to the admission of strangers who come spontaneously. For so long as their nation continues at peace with ours, and they themselves behave peaceably, they are under the king's protection; though liable to be sent home whenever the king sees occasion. But no subject of a nation at war with us can, by the law of nations, come into the realm, nor can travel himself upon the high seas, or send his goods and merchandize from one place to another, without danger of being seized by our subjects, unless he has letters of safe-conduct; which by divers antient statutes[b] must be granted under the king's great seal and inrolled in chancery, or else are of no effect: the king being supposed the best judge of such emergencies, as may deserve exception from the general law of arms.

[Footnote a: Law of N. and N. b. 3. c. 3. --. 9.]

[Footnote b: 15 Hen. VI. c. 3. 18 Hen. VI. c. 8. 20 Hen. VI. c. 1.]

INDEED the law of England, as a commercial country, pays a very particular regard to foreign merchants in innumerable instances. One I cannot omit to mention: that by _magna carta_[c] it is provided, that all merchants (unless publickly prohibited beforehand) shall have safe conduct to depart from, to come into, to tarry in, and to go through England, for the exercise of merchandize, without any unreasonable imposts, except in time of war: and, if a war breaks out between us and their country, they shall be attached (if in England) without harm of body or goods, till the king or his chief justiciary be informed how our merchants are treated in the land with which we are at war; and, if ours be secure in that land, they shall be secure in ours.

This seems to have been a common rule of equity among all the northern nations; for we learn from Stiernhook[d], that it was a maxim among the Goths and Swedes, "_quam legem exteri n.o.bis posuere, eandem illis ponemus_." But it is somewhat extraordinary, that it should have found a place in _magna carta_, a mere interior treaty between the king and his natural-born subjects; which occasions the learned Montesquieu to remark with a degree of admiration, "that the English have made the protection of _foreign_ merchants one of the articles of their _national_ liberty[e]." But indeed it well justifies another observation which he has made[f], "that the English know better than any other people upon earth, how to value at the same time these three great advantages, religion, liberty, and commerce." Very different from the genius of the Roman people; who in their manners, their const.i.tution, and even in their laws, treated commerce as a dishonorable employment, and prohibited the exercise thereof to persons of birth, or rank, or fortune[g]: and equally different from the bigotry of the canonists, who looked on trade as inconsistent with christianity[h], and determined at the council of Melfi, under pope Urban II, _A.D._ 1090, that it was impossible with a safe conscience to exercise any traffic, or follow the profession of the law[i].

[Footnote c: _c._ 30.]

[Footnote d: _de jure Sueon._ _l._ 3. _c._ 4.]