Foreign Relations of the United States, 1902, United States vs. Mexico, In the matter of the case of the Pious Fund of the Californias, Appendix II

seiziéme séance.

30 septembre 1902 (matin).

Le Tribunal se réunit à 9¾ heures du piatin, tous les Arbitres étant présents.

M. le Président. Je déclare que maintenant les séances continueront sans interruption, dans les heures fixées. De plus, le Tribunal sans vouloir en aucune manière enchaîner la liberté des orateurs et tout en respectant leur liberté, exprime le désir que les conseils veuillent bien dans leurs discours éviter autant que possible des répétitions inutiles.

La parole est au conseil des Etats-Unis d’Amérique M. Descamps.

M. Descamps. Messieurs les arbitres, je ne prolongerai pas—autant que je le pourrais faire—le débat concernant l’autorité de la chose jugée en produisant de nombreuses citations et de longues analyses des jugements rendus dans les divers pays. Je me borne à renvoyer aux ouvrages qui ont été signalés par mes confrères américains, et dont les extraits principaux ont été reproduits spécialement par M. Ralston. J’y ajouterai, en ce qui concerne la France et la Belgique, deux grands recueils: les Pandectes françaises et les Pandectes belges, dans lesquels l’orientation est facile et qui donnent un aspect d’ensemble de la jurisprudence de ces pays.

Je me permets de relever dans les Pandectes beiges v°, Chose jugée n° 169, le passage suivant, “La chose jugée peut done résulter d’une décision simplement implicite, c’est-à-dire d’une conséquence nécessaire mais non formulée, d’une disposition expresse.” De même en effect que la volonté du législateur peut être constatée réelle et certaine, sous une forme implicite comme sousune forme explicite; ainsi c’est à la volonté réelle et certaine du juge, et non exclusivement à la forme explicite ou implicite de sa manifestation, qu’il importe de s’attacher la thèse contraire aboutirait souvent à des conséquences aussi étranges qu’injustifiées. La volonté réelle du juge, comme la volonté réelle du législateur: voilà le point de mire des investigations de l’interprète.

Le § 425 des Pandectes françaises formule une règle semblable à celle du n° 169 Pandectes beiges et le § 449 s’attache à nous donner un guide de nature à orienter le juge dans la solution de la question de savoir si telle prétention des parties tombe ou ne tombe pas sous le coup de la chose antérieurement jugée. Ce n’est au fond que l’application du critérium de contradiction.

M. de Martens. Pouvons-nous profiter de ces deux volumes?

M. Descamps. Evidemment. Il y à là, comme dans tous les recueils semblables des accumulations de documents qui ne sont pas toujours en parfaite concordance, mais les matériaux n’en demeurent pas moins précieux et signalent en tout cas tous les aspects de la question.

J’ai tâché de me rendre un compte pratique des contradictions éventuelles qui pourraient survenir entre l’ancienne décision arbitrale et la nouvelle, si les prétentions des défendeurs étaient admises: cette comparaison est très instructive.

J’ai aussi mis en regard des prétentions d’autrefois celles d’aujourd’hui, et sauf quelques moyens nouveaux qui, par cela même qu’ils ont la qualité de simples moyens, ne peuvent pas porter atteinte à la chose jugée, j’ai constaté que sur toute la ligne, on reproduisait les mêmes arguments, dont le juge d’autrefois à fait bonne et définitive justice.

Bonne et définite justice en effet: car après avoir montré qu’il y à en cette affaire chose jugée, je tiens à prouver brièvement qu’il y à aussi chose bien jugée, en tenant compte de tous les éléments dont le surarbitre à disposé lorsqu’il à rendu sa décision, et l’on ne peut demander rien autre chose à un juge.

J’ai déjà signalé dans une courte analyse les points lumineux de la première sentence arbitrale, ceux où l’arbitare tranche, par des raisons frappantes, avec un grand sens de justice et au point de vue de la bonne foi, les difficultés accumulées comme à plaisir dans cette affaire.

Sans relever ici toutes ces difficultés dont beaucoup ne sont point pertinentes en la cause, je voudrais signaler et faire en quelque sorte toucher du doigt les causes d’erreur qui vicient tout le système d’argumentation de nos adversaires, et qui doivent, selon moi, détourner la cour de tout ralliement à leurs conclusions.

I. Une première cause les erreurs où versent nos contradicteurs—je l’ai signalée dans une première plaidoirie, avant de traiter la question de la chose jugée—c’est l’idée qu’ils se font de la prépondérance nécessaire, absolue, exclusive des lois mexicaines en cette affaire. J’ai montré qu’il n’était pas possible de faire table rase à ce point et du droit international public et du droit international privé et de l’équité dont les arbitres sont aussi les ministres, selon les termes et l’esprit du compromis. Je ne reviens pas sur ce point.

II. Une seconde cause des erreurs que l’on peut constater dans nombre de raisonnements de nos adversaires, c’est la notion inexacte qu’ils se font du trust, qui est caractéristique des fondations californiennes en litige. Le droit français qui semble avoir servi de guide exclusif à nos adversaires ignore presque entièrement cette notion, ou plutôt il l’insinue dans le cadre des donations sub modo. De là les méprises que l’on peut constater au début des conclusions déposées en cours d’instance par MM Beernaert et Delacroix.

Le trust anglais, la stiftung allemande, la fondation proprement dite attachent une libéralité, un patrimoinet à un office. Il y à le trustee et celui qui trust. Faut-il proscrire cette forme de libéralité? Ne faut-il pas plutôt la réglementer de manière à éviter les abus et à sauvegarder l’ordre public? Ce que l’on appelle le domaine éminent de l’Etat sur les trust va-t-il jusqu’à permettre à l’Etat de dire à chaque instant: “Le trust, c’est moi?” Ce serait, la négation même de la notion du trust.

Le dépôt et l’administration du fonds qui compose le trust, le pouvoir d’obtenir et de disposer des revenus qu’il produit ne doivent pas être confondus. Ces attributs peuvent se rencontrer dans la même main. Ils peuvent aussi être séparés et créer des droits respectifs fort distinct.

L’acte constitutif du trust peut reconnaître à telle personne ou à tel pouvoir le droit de pourvoir dans telle éventuallté à telle désignation, par exemple, à la désignation de l’ayant droit aux revenus, sans conférer pour cela à cette personne ou à ce pouvoir une faculté ad nutum, ou le droit de disposer souverainement du trust et de ses revenus selon le bon plaisir: ce qui serait encore une fois la négation du trust dans sa destination propre liée à son essence.

Il ne suffit pas d’ailleurs—et nous insisterons bientôt sur ce point—il ne suffit pas a’affirmer que le souverain, en vertu de son domaine éminent, aurait le droit de disposer, personnellement et à tous égards, du trust pour prouver qu’il à usé de ce droit et surtout qu’il en à usé au moment décisif en la cause, c’est-à-dire, dans le cas présent, au moment qui précède le démembrement des Californies.

La méconnaissance des divers points que nous venons de signaler se manifeste dans un grand nombre de déductions de nos adversaires.

III. Une troisièrne cause d’erreur chez eux est l’éloignement où ils se tiennent le plus souvent de ce que l’on peut appeler le coeur de la question, le propre siège de la matière. à nos yeux, ce qu’il importe de déterminer pour la solution du litige actuel, ce sont ces deux points fondamentaux:

1°. Constater aussi nettement que possible la situation juridique, et spécialement l’attitude du pouvoir souverain, au moment qui à précédé la séparation des deux Californies;

2°. Fixer aussi exactement que possible les conséquences juridiques du démembrement de territoire survenu, pour un trust dont le champ d’activité conforme à sa destination ce trouve manif estement coupé en deux tronçons, et dont l’organe agissant et ayant droit aux revenus se trouve lui aussi scindé en deux organismes. C’est sur ces deux points qu’il faut surtout faire la lumière.

La plupart des autres questions peuvent sans doute édifier plus ou moins le ]uge, mais ne fixeront point sa décision juridique. Les développements qu’on leur consacre sont en quelque sorte des préambules quand ils ne sont pas des hors d’œuvre.

IV. Une quatrième cause des erreurs où versent nos adversaires se trouve dans la méconnaissance pratique de ce fait, qu’une loi, un décret, n’est pas toujours exclusivement un acte de souveraineté imposant d’autorité des commandements ou des défenses; qu’ils peuvent au contraire renf ermer des éléments obligationnels dont l’acceptation ou la ratification par les intéressés aboutit à l’existence d’un véritable contrat.

Et à ce point de vue il faut constater que l’interprétation donnée par nos contradicteurs au décret du 28 octobre 1842, qui est d’importance capitale dans la cause, est singulièrement erronée.

Ils y voient un acte de confiscation, alors que toute sa teneur nous démontre qu’il ne renferme qu’une transformation de valeurs, avantageuse pour l’Etat sans doute, mais que ne diffère pas en soi des actes communément appelés remplois.

Et la combinaison recherchée—la combinazione, comme disent les Italiens—n’est pas difficile à saisir: un Etat en besoin de ressources immédiates nous apparaît comme transformant une valeur à réaliser immédiatement à son profit en une valeur soldable à des échéances futures bien écbelonnées.

Grâce à cette combinaison, il devient propriétaire des immeubles et valeurs du Fonds des Californies et ils les vendra pour disposer du prix. Mais il n’entend aucunement s’approprier la contre-valeur qu’il substitue immédiatement à ces biens, c’est-à-dire la rente.

Ses déclarations à ce sujet sont formelles, absolues. Il déclare expressément “vouloir réaliser en toute exactitude les buts charitables et nationaux que le fondateur s’est proposé, sans la moindre perte des Mens destinés à cette institution.”

Il caractérise non moinsnettement le moyen qu’il entend employer à cet effet: “capitaliser les biens qui appartiennent en propre au Fonds pie en les plaçant à intérêt, en rentes, sous de dues guaranties.”

Et c’est ce qu’il fait—car les actes sont parf aitement d’accord ici avec les déclarations—par une double opération qui le rend, d’une part, propriétaire à fin de vente, des propriétés rurales et urbaines et autres biens composant le Fond pie—qui le rend, d’autre part, débiteur d’une rente annuelle égale au revenu à 6 p. c. du capital représentatif des biens vendus; ce qui simplifie et même rend inutiles les fonctions d’administration.

Et l’Etat se constitue non seulement débiteur ordinaire, mais débiteur sous “due garantie,” comme il l’a déclaré. à titre de garantie, il affecte spécialement le revenu des tabacs au paiement de la rente (al pago de los reditos correspondentes al capital del referido fundo de Californias).

Et il règle comme suit la délivrance des mandats de paiement. “La direction du Département des finances prestera (entregara, délivrera, remettra en main) les sommes nécessaires pour remplir les objets auxquels ce fonds est destiné, et cela “sans aucune déduction pour frais d’administration ou autres quelconques.”

Il n’est pas nécessaire d’avoir des connaissances approfondies en langue espagnole pour savior que al pago signifie au payement et non à la donation, et que entregar correspond au latin tradere, délivrer, remettre dans la main, prester. En rapprochant ce dernier mot du terme al pago, aucun doute ne peut subsister quant au sens du décret de 1812.

Mais ce n’est pas assez: nous pouvons constater l’exécution du décret à l’égard des ayants droit par le Gouvernement d’une manière conf orme à la signification que nous venons d’établir. Si en effet, nous lisons la page 149 du Memorial, nous constaterons l’existence d’un ordre de payement sur la douane maritime de Guyamos, paru au Diario de Mexico sous la date du 23 avril 1844, et dont le titulaire est “Juan Rodriguez de San Miguel comme représentant du T. R. évêque des Californies.”

Voilà pour la contre-valeur des biens vendues du “Fonds des Californies.” Quant aux biens in vendus au 3 avril 1845, le décret de cette date ordonne leur restitution aux évêques de cette mitre et à ses succes seurs. En présence de tels faits, soutenir que les décrets de 1842 et de 1845 ne renferment aucune obligation véritable envers les évêques de Californie, c’est—pour emprunter à S. E. M. Pardo une de ses expressions—“fermer les yeux à la lumière de l’évidence.”

Pour nous, nous avons la claire vue de cette vérité juridique: au moment où allait se fixer par voie de séparation les destinées politiques des deux Californies, l’Etat mexicain se considérait comme le débiteur de la contre-valeur des fondations calif orniennes, fondations alimentées par la charité privée, pour être appliquées à un but apostolique, dans un champ particulier de travail (les deux Californies) par une organisation religieuse particulière non moins nettement déterminée et représentée par l’évêque catholique des Californies.

On à soutenu qu’entre l’instant où l’Eglise catholique est devenue la ressortissante des Etats-Unis et le moment où elle à pu régulariser sa situation dans l’Etat de Californie, le Mexique à eu le pouvoir de faire main-basse sur ses droits. Mais traiter ainsi toutes les situations qui ont besoin d’un certain temps pour s’accommoder à un nouvel état de choses serait souverainement inéquitable et même nettement injuste. Ce n’est pas ainsi que le traité de Guadalupe-Hidalgo à réglé ce genre de situation transitoire et nous trouvons précisément dans ce traité un article ainsi conçu, concernant les Mexicains qui ne gardent pas le caractère de eitoyens du Mexiqui et qui ne sont pas encore admis à la jouissance de tous les droits de citoyen des Etats-Unis.

Entre temps, ils seront maintenues et protégés dans la jouissance de leur liberté et de leurs propriétés et garantis quant au libre exercice de leur religion, sans restriction aucune.

IV. Mais j’arrive à signaler une nouvelle et quatrième cause des erreurs qui sont à la base des thèses soutenues par.nos adversaires: c’est la méconnaissance des conséquences naturelles et juridiques du démembrements des Etats.

Deux faits sont certains:

1°. Par la cession de la Haute Californie aux Etas-Unis, le champ effectif d’opération des fondations californiennes à été scindé en deux parties;

2°. Par cette même cession, l’organe appelé à fonctionner sur ce champ et avant droit au payement de la rente représentative des revenus du trust s’est également trouvé partagé en deux parties.

On affirme que le traité de Guadalupe-Hidalgo à résolu ce cas, mais on est loin de le prouver, et le Mexique, dans nombre de conventions, à reconnu la contraire, car ses allégations d’incompétence ne datent pas du premier compromis d’arbitrage, et le cas des évêques de la Haute Californie était depuis longtemps soumis à l’arbitrage aux dates où le compromis initial fut à diverses reprises prorogé par le Gouvernement mexicain.

Il serait plus exact de dire que le traité de Guadalupe-Hildalgo à créé le cas sans le trancher. Et l’on sait de reste que dans les questions de toute espèce si compliquées auxquelles peuvent donner lieu les annexions, les instruments diplomatiques sont toujours imparf aits. Il faut régler selon la justice et l’équité les situations nouvelles.

Le droit pour l’Église catholique de la Haute-Californie de réclamer une part de la contre-valeur, représentative du Fonds des Californies semble diffieilement discutable. La quotité de cette part est plus délicate à etablir. à défaut d’autre base de répartition pleinement satisfaisante, la règle ordinaire communément reçue et pratiquée est le partage par moitié. C’est une règle un peu grossière si l’on veut mais elle est dictée, en l’absence de norme meilleure, par le bon sens et l’équite. C’est elle qu’a l’appliquée l’arbitre.

V. Une cinquième source des erreurs que l’on peut relever dans les discours de nos adversaires réside dans une certaine tendance à ne pas tenir un compte suffisant des faits, et à leur opposer des droits théoriques qui, eussent-ils existé avec le caractère et l’éntendue qu’on leur attribue, n’ont pas été exercés dans dans cette mesure.

Il ne s’agit pas seulement de savoir ce que les Gouvernements successifs avaient, en principe, le droit de faire quant aux fondations californiennes. On peut soutenir, comme l’ont fait nos adversaires, qu’un souverain peut traiter selon son bon plaisir tous les trust de son empire.

Nous préférons admettre qu’il à le droit de les réglementer pour éviter les abus et dans les limites des exigences de l’ordre public. Mais là n’est pas la question. Il s’agit de savoir non ce qu’on à pu faire, mais ce que l’on à fait.

Il arrive dans la destineéde trust que des difficultés, des cas imprévus, se présentent, et alors on est amené à appliquer cette sage maxime: potius interpretandus est actus ut valeat quam ut pereat.

Il se présente des situations que l’on peut appeler intérimaires ou d’attente; on pratique fréquemment alors quant aux revenus ce que l’on appelle le procédé de la conservation.

Il peut se faire que dans l’acte de fondation on prévoie certaines éventualités extrêmes, par example l’extinction des successeurs réguliers des dispensateurs autorisés des revenus, et que l’on autorise à pourvoir à la continuité de la succession.

Nous trouvons quelque chose de semblable dans l’acte type des f ondations calif orniennes Il est certain que le Gouvernement espagnol s’est considéré comme autorisé à désigner, à défaut de la lignée primitive de missionnaires, lignée éteinte par suppression, une autre lignée d’évangélisateurs.

Il est non moins avéré qu’à un moment donné le chef des missions calif orniennes, Diego, à été, à la demande du Gouvernement mexicain, créé évêque des Californies, et cela en connexion non douteuse avec la réalisation des intentions des fondateurs du “Fondo piedoso.”

Il est établi que des obligations ont été ultérieurement assumées par l’Etat mexicain, car il n’est pas possible de soutenir qu’il se soit simplement engagé à faire des payements d’un genre inconnu en droit; des payements sans créancier ni débiteur. Il est de toute évidence que ces obligations ont été contractées, comme le rappelle le Décret de 1845, “envers les évêques de cette mitre et leurs successeurs.”

On peut critiquer cela, quoique bien à tort, au point de vue du développement des missions, ou à tel au tel point de vue. Mais l’Etat, qui à sollicité l’établissement de cette situation et qui l’a corisacré par ses actes, est mai venu, ee semble, à s’en plaindre. Et on peut en tout cas lui appliquer justement la maxime: patere legem quam ipse fecisti!

C’est peut-être ce que nos contradicteurs ont trop oublié.

VI. Je me permets de signaler enfin une dernière source des erreurs commises par eux. Elle tient à certains procédés de négation, qui dépassent à notre sens la mesure. En entendant nos contradicteurs nier jusqu’à la réalité du Fondo piedoso, nous nous sommes rappelés ce nihilisme transcendental dont l’expression à été consignée, dit-on, dans cette célèbre constitution imaginée en trois articles: Art. ler. Il n’y à plus rien. Art. 2. C’est tout. Art. 3. Nul n’est chargé de l’exécution du présent décret.

Et voyez la série des négations dont on nous à gratifiés!

Il n’y à pas d’arbitrage international dans cette affaire.

Il n’y à pas de droit international public ou privé limitant les lois mexicaines.

Il n’y à pas d’équité à invoquer.

Il n’y à pas eu de Fonds des Californies sérieusement existant.

Il n’y à pas eu de rente.

Il n’y à plus d’indiens.

Il n’y à plus de missions.

Il n’y à plus d’obligation.

Il n’y à plus d’ayants droit.

Il n’y à pas de chose jugée.

Il n’y à pas eu compétence dans le chef de l’arbitre.

Enfin—comme conclusion dernière—nous ne devons rien.

C’est ce qui la cour aura à apprécier et à décider. Si elle aborde le fond, elle constatera, je n’en doute pas, qu’il y à des Indiens, des missions, une rente et des ayants-droit. Mais à mon sens elle constatera avant tout ceci, qui la dispense de revenir sur le fond: il y à chose jugée.

Un mot encore sur un point important: celui de la monnaie en laquelle les annuités échues et non payées devront être éventuellement soldées. L’or et l’argent se disputent ici la palme, mais avec des mérites inégaux.

Voici les raisons qui doivent, selon moi, faire pencher la balance de la justice du côté de l’or.

1. La sentence du 24 octobre 1876 nous adjuge définitivement le payement en or. La monnaie est une marchandise possédant un pouvoir d’acheter déterminé. Changer cette marchandise serait changer très gravement ce qui nous à été réellement adjugé, par le premier arbitre.

Nos adversaires sont en désaccord avec nous sur l’étendue de la chose jugée, mais ils admettent tout au moins que la chose jugée s’étend à ce qui’ls appellent “les résultats immédiatement pratiques de la sentence.”

Or le payement en or rentre précisement dans cette partie incontestée du premier jugement arbitral.

2. Nos contradicteurs allèguent, il est vrai, qu’au moment où fut rendue la première sentence la question de la monnaie en laquelle la dette devait être soldée n’avait aucune importance, les deux métaux s’équilibrant comme valeur. Mais d’abord ils n’ont point fourni la preuve exacte de ce fait, et nous remarquons, en tout cas, dans les compromis la mention courante du payement “en or ou dans son equivalent:” ce qui ne laisse de place au payement en argent que sous réserve de conserver le rapport des deux métaux en prenant pour base le payement en or. D’autre part, s’il est vrai, comme ils l’affirment que les biens autrefois vendus leur ont été payés en argent il est non vrai que cet argent avait alors un autre rapport avec l’or qu’aujourd’hui et qu’ils sont mai venus à prétendre qu’aucun compte ne doive être tenu de cette différence.

3. La latitude du payement en argent laissée à nos adversaires serait contraire au principe juridique universellement admis: Nemo ex suâ culpâ commodum acquirere debet. En effet, le fait de n’avoir point payé les annuités où moment ou ils auraient dû les payer deviendrait, un titre pour s’acquitter dans une monnaie dépréciée.” Tout ce qu’ils pourraient prétendre à leur point de vue, ce serait de payer chaque année suivant le rapport existant alors entre l’or et l’argent: ce rapport n’est pas difficile à constater.

4. Nous ne sommes pas ici sur le terrain des simples conventions de droit privé où l’on peut essayer de faire prévaloir une solution exclusivement favorable au débiteur: il s’agit d’une dette créée par la loi. Or le décret de 1842, soit que l’on considère son texte, soit que l’on consulte son esprit, n’est pas favorable à la prétention de nos ad versaires.

Aux termes de ce décret, l’annuité doit nous être remise dans la main, c’est le sens du mot entregar de l’article 3 du décret. La dette est done portable, et non quérable. Et après le démembrement, convenu par traité, des Californies, notre partde dette exigible est devenue régulièrement payable dans notre pays. L’importance de cette observation n’échappera point à ceux qui estiment que la loi du lieu où l’obligation doit être exécutée est régulatrice des modalités de l’exécution.

D’autre part, il suffit de lire le décret de 1842 pour saisir que l’intention formelle du législateur de cette époque à été de nous assurer une contre-valeur intégrale des biens vendus, il à voulu que nous ne subissions aucune perte, même du chef des frais d’administration et à fortiori du chef d’une monnaie dépréciée. Il à voulu nous assurer un situation in integrum.

Certes, nous ne pouvons être à l’abri de toutes les causes qui peuvent influer dans un pays sur la valeur relative des choses. Nous estimons simplement que nous n’avons pas à supporter celle qui se rattache à la dépréciation d’un des métaux, instrument des échanges. Une chose est certaine, c’est que si le Fonds pieux nous eût été laissé dans sa constitution propre, on eût, dans les baux par exemple, stipulé un chiffre supérieur pour le payement en monnaie dépréciée que pour le payement en monnaie non dépreciée.

5. L’or est l’instrument général des payments internationaux. …

M. Pardo. Ah!

M. Descamps. L’or lingot et l’or monnaie ne sont guère différents de valeur et ainsi on à toujours dela marchandise pour sa valeur réelle. Par suite du traité de démembrement, la dette ayant pris un caractère international implicitement consacré, il y a lieu de la payer en or

On est en effet généralement d’accord, tout au moins dans les liquidations de comptes d’ordre international, qu’un Etat ne peut se libérer par exemple, en papier-monnaie de son cru. Or lorsqu’il attribue à tel métal, chez lui, une valeur supérieure de près de moitié à sa valeur comme marchandise, ce métal est dans cette mesure un véritable papier-monnaie qu’il n’est ni équitable ni juste d’essayer d’imposer à sa valeur nominale comme libération de paiements internationaux.

6. Enfin, en équité, il ne serait pas juste ne nous faire subir ce double dommage:

1°. Celui du non-payment des intérêts des intérêts;

2°. Celui du payement dans une monnaie dépréciée.

Et cela d’autant plus qu’aucune des deux raisons pour lesquelles l’arbitre ne nous a pas accordé les intérêts des intérêts, ne demeure debout aujourd’hui.

Nous avons reconnu loyalement que cette circonstance, sur le terrain de la chose jugée, n’est par relevante pour nous. Mais si nous sommes condamnés à perdre sur ce terrain le bénéfice des pièces nouvelles produites par nous, c’est une raison pour que nous ne perdions pas d’autre part le bénéfice d’une situation acquise consacrée par le dictum de l’arbitre.

Car il faut en revenir là. Il y a dans cette affaire une position que nous avons le droit de ne pas abandonner. Nous avons de 1868 à 1875 lutté sur la haute mer pour arriver enfin à ce port abrité contre le flot des arguments juridiques: la chose jugée. Il est peu d’arbitrages qui aient été plus longs, plus disputés, plus mouvementés: opinions des défenseurs des deux parts, opinions des commissaires, nouvelles instances des défenseurs, statut du surarbitre, pétition de revision avec amplification, double décision nouvelle de surarbitre: rien n’a manqué à cette procédure arbitrale espacée sur sept années.

Aujourd’hui nous n’avons pas, certes, refusé de nous livrer à un nouveau combat sur la haute mer et nous avons à bon escient augmenté nos engins de lutte; mais c’est en conservant toujours le droit de retour à notre port d’attache. Ici nous ne demandons que le respect de la chose jugée. Là-bas nous insistons pour que sanction soit donnée dans la plus large mesure à des engagements dont nous nous efforçons, à l’aide de moyens nouveaux, de marquer la portée etles conséquences.

La Cour appréciera l’un et l’autre de ces procédés, dont le premier garde un caractère principal et dont le second demeure subsidiaire.

Un dernier mot. On dit qu’un riche citoyen de la nation, pour laquelle j’ai l’honneur de parler en ce moment, s’apprête à doter la Cour arbitrale d’un magnifique Paleis. Si ce magnanime dessein se réalise, peut-êtra n’est-il point de plus belle devise à mettre au fronton de cet édifice que celle de la l’Institut de Droit international—Justitiâ et Pace: car ce sera bien là que la Justice et la Paix s’embrasseront d’une fraternelle étreinte. Et si le palais, comme je l’espère, s’agrandit dans l’avenir, si de nouvelles ailes s’y déploient, et que de nouveaux frontons réclament de nouvelles devises je ne vois point d’inscriptions plus lumineusement expressives des exigences fondamentales de l’ordre juridique international que ces deux maximes, où j’ai essayé de résumer ma pensée en commençant cette plaidoirie: Pacta servanda! Res judicata veritas inter partes!

M. le Président. La parole est au conseil des Etats-Unis d’Amérique M. Penfield.

Mr. Penfield. Mr. President and honorable arbitrators: Inclosing the argument on the part of the United States, it will not be expected that I should attempt to do more than briefly to restate and accentuate the principal contentions of associate counsel who have preceded me and to make suitable reply to the arguments of those speaking on behalf of the Republic of Mexico. In the course of my argument, therefore, I shall seek only to refer to established facts and to settled principles, simply in order to illustrate our theme and to reinforce the position of the United States—a position which has been frankly disclosed in the diplomatic correspondence without concealments, without evasion, and with that spirit of fairness and candor worthy of a great State.

The prime motive which inspired the formation of the Hague Convention was to secure the establishment of international justice. One of its chief objects was to afford sure redress for whatever injury may be arbitrarily inflicted by the government of one State upon the subjects of another. Unfortunately, the juridical fact has sometimes been momentarily overlooked or forgotten, that the supreme authority of the State which arbitrarily injures the property right of the subject of another State incurs the just obligation of fulfilling the duties thereby entailed.

It is these arbitrary injuries to private right which constitute, unhappily, the long list of grievances which in the past have been preferred by governments on behalf of their subjects against offending States. These grievances have been summarily settled sometimes by the strong arm of the government acting on behalf of its injured subjects; and this has given rise to grave complaints by the distinguished publicist, Mr. Calvo, of the forcible collection of exorbitant indemnities.

The States of the Western Hemisphere recently held an international conference at the City of Mexico, with a view to find some just and satisfactory solution of this grave problem; and the result was that the project of a treaty was signed by the delegates of the States there assembled, under which such controversies between those States are to be tentatively referred, for a period of five years, to the permanent court provided by the Hague Convention.

Without exaggeration, therefore, I may say that the eyes of the western world are now turned toward this judicatory; for the sessions now held by this high court and its determinations, of vast moment as they are to the nations of the Old World, are even more so, if that were possible, to those of the Western Hemisphere. The decision, which will make for the reign of law and justice among nations, and for law and justice between the State and the humblest individual, will by its benign influence and beneficent example, tend to increase respect for private right and to put an end to the mutual grievances complained of in the past, of arbitrary acts of the State with respect to vested right on the one hand, and on the other, to the collection of indemnities by military execution—complaints which have in the past sorely perplexed the diplomacy and sometimes imperiled the relations of otherwise friendly States.

I hope I do not trespass too far upon your indulgent consideration if I say that upon this tribunal is therefore cast a most solemn responsibility—weighty as regards the litigant States who are parties to this controversy, and of incalculable importance by the lasting impression its determinations will produce upon the States of the Old World and upon the sense of law and justice among the peoples of the western world. The high precedent now set by your decision will live in its effects upon social order in the Western Hemisphere and will live in its influence upon the cause of international arbitration.

On this occasion of the sitting of the first court organized under The Hague Convention, we owe a passing tribute to His Imperial Majesty the Czar of Russia for the lofty conception and initiative which has finally led to the creation of the present tribunal, and to the additional security provided for the judicial protection of private right and for the preservation of the pacific relations of States.

Not less honor does the world owe to the memory of Her Majesty the late Queen and Empress for the generous response of the British Government to the magnanimous views of the Czar.

Equal honor is due to the sympathetic action of His Majesty the King of Denmark—the land whose folk and speech have left their beneficent and enduring impress upon the civilization of the United States; and honor too, in overflowing measure, to Her Majesty the most gracious Queen of the Fatherland, whose race has given two Presidents to the United States, for the generous support of the project by her Government and for the hospitality we enjoy in a land distinguished by equal laws, whose prophetic spirit was expressed by the pen of Grotius in the Common Law of Nations.

Fortunate are the States who appear before a tribunal thus constituted and inspired with the spirit of these mighty traditions, which are summed up in the single idea of international justice, unfettered by the narrow technicalities of procedure, and by the summum jus, the summa injuria of literal constructions; an idea which was formulated in the immortal words of Justinian: “Justice is the constant and perpetual will to render to every one his due.” That justice we here invoke.

It would be futile and, therefore, an unpardonable breach of the sorely taxed patience of this tribunal to dwell in detail upon all the particular statements and arguments of counsel for Mexico, or to review at length the history of the Pious Fund of the Californias. I shall only attempt to reply to Mexico’s principal contentions which seem to merit some observation.

As the basis of the reply, I beg leave briefly to restate the foundation facts of our case.

The militant spirit of the Roman Catholic religion doubtless inspired the zeal of its votaries in their contribution of munificent donations, in their unselfish devotion and infinite labors to propagate the truths of the Evangel, under the auspices of the Pope. His power was then both spiritual and temporal, and the primary object of all the religious orders was to extend this spiritual dominion of the Vicar of Christ. And it is contrary to the expressed will of the donors of the benefactions; it is contrary to the evidence before the tribunal and contrary to historical truth to assume that the object of the donations was national or political, or to contend that the Catholic Church was not, in the understanding of all its members and orders, the church universal. The King of Spain was His Catholic Majesty. He did not hold the keys of St. Peter—he was a son of the church, and in respect of matters spiritual was loyal to the church. Whatever motives actuated him in the expulsion of the Jesuits and in the sequestration of their property, it would be inconsistent with the conspicuous loyalty of his religious character and with the tenor and spirit of his decree of expulsion to suppose that he did not, after having dispossessed the Jesuits and after the Pope, through his influence, had suppressed the order, which was thereby disabled to exercise the functions of the trust—it would be an unwarranted reproach upon his memory to assume that he did not propose and undertake to administer the trust in the spirit of its founders. These observations equally apply to the Government of Mexico down to 1845, except during the presidency of Santa Anna, whose hand of spoliation was restrained by the conscience of his people and was marked by what was, in effect, a solemn acknowledgment of the arbitrary character of his act by the engagement, binding upon the nation, that 6 per cent interest should be paid upon the capital of the fund and devoted to the pious uses to which the properties had been dedicated.

Among those who contributed to promote the work of evangelization, which was carried on in all parts of the world, and notably in the unexplored regions of the New World, were the donors of the estates which were especially devoted to the objects and uses generically described in the term “the Pious Fund of the Californias.” The leading object of the benefactions was declared in the deed made by the Marquis de Villapuente and the Marquesa de las Torres de Rada, in 1735, of the vast estates which were expressly granted to the Society of Jesus “for the missions founded and hereafter founded in the Californias,” so that all the rents and profits thereof should “be applied to the purposes and objects herein specified, namely, the propagation of our holy Catholic faith.”

This was the cardinal object of the numerous donations made during the period of 1697 to 1768, and which, as shown by the evidence, aggregated a sum of over $1,700,000. And this sum is found not in fictitious, exaggerated, and unsupported statements of counsel, but from the historical evidences preserved in the archives of the Republic of Mexico.

It not infrequently happens that lapse of time and changed circumstances make it impossible to execute a trust, or some of its incidents, through the instrumentalities contemplated by its founder; but always, through whatever change of time and circumstance, it has been the just and wise policy of the State, in favor of charitable uses, to provide through some of its organs, administrative or judicial, for the faithful execution of the fundamental object of the trust. And it is to the honor of the Spanish and Mexican Governments that whatever national or political motive inspired the sequestration of the Pious Fund, they have always recognized in their decrees and laws the leading object of the benefactions.

Thus, during a period of one hundred and thirty-five years a practical and substantially uniform construction has been placed on the donations by the supreme authorities of Spain and of Mexico, and on the obligation devolved upon the Government, resulting from the siezure by the State of the property which had been irrevocably and inalienably dedicated by the founders to pious uses.

Thus, it is a conceded fact, which does not admit of discussion, that the Crown of Spain, from 1767 to the date of the independence of Mexico, recognized the sacred obligation which devolved upon the Government from the sequestration of the property.

It is also shown by its decrees and legislation that the Government of Mexico, after her independence was achieved, succeeded to the possession and administration of the trust, and solemnly enacted that its income, firstly, in the form of rents, and secondly, in the form of interest, should be devoted to the uses destined by the donors; declaring in the law of 1832 that the proceeds of the leased properties should be “solely and exclusively destined to the missions of the Californias;” declaring in the law of 1836 that “the property belonging to the Pious Fund of the Californias” shall be by the newly created bishop of the two Californias and his successors “managed and employed for its objects or other similar ones, always respecting the wishes of the founders of the fund;” providing by the law of April 1, 1837, for the negotiation of à loan by the Government from the Pious Fund, pledging the maritime customs to secure the payment thereof, and moreover mortgaging said fund, “coming upon this point to an agreement with the ecclesiastical authority;” thereby recognizing in 1837 the ownership of the fund by the ecclesiastical authorities; declaring by the decree of February 8, 1842, that the fund should be administered by the Government “for the purpose of carrying out the intention of the donor in the civilization and conversion of the savages;” and reaffirming in the decrees of 1842, 1844, and 1845 the trust character in which the property or fund was held by the Government, in accordance with the object to which it had been devoted by the founders.

Finally, after the question has been under agitation during a period of forty years; after it has been the subject of one arbitration and is now the subject of another, the Mexican minister for foreign affairs, Mr. Mariscal, makes answer, in this case, solemnly admitting that the Jesuits were the original trustees of the Pious Fund; that after the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1767 the Spanish Crown took possession of and administered the properties which constituted the Pious Fund until the independence of Mexico was achieved; and that the Mexican Government succeeded the Spanish Government as trustee of the fund with all the rights granted to the missionaries by the founders.

Inasmuch as neither Spain nor Mexico ever asserted or exercised a discretionary right of disposition, and inasmuch as such right was personal to the Jesuits who had been incapacitated from exercising the right by the act of the Pope suppressing the order in 1773, rendering such personal disposition impossible, it follows that if Mexico took the properties charged with the subsisting rights of the Jesuits, it was charged with the duties which correspond to the rights of the beneficiaries of the trust.

In declaring the legal consequences attached to the action of the Spanish and Mexican Governments the question is not important whether that action was taken in the exercise of one or another prerogative of sovereignty—whether in the exercise of the despotic power of Nero, of life and death, and of uncompensated confiscation of the property of his subject, or the legitimate power of eminent domain—the regulated power of the sovereign to expropriate, upon reasonable compensation to be made therefor, the property of the subject to the uses of the States. But Mexico disavowed any purpose of confiscation, and it is not in this presence that the exercise of either power could be successfully vindicated as lawful and right. And our honorable opponents, in that spirit which has at all times done honor to the character of the jurisconsult—our opponents admit that the action of the Mexican Government in the sequestration of the properties of the Illous Fund was wrong; yet, if I understand their position, they ask this honorable tribunal to consecrate another wrong of the same character by an award legalizing the refusal of Mexico to mitigate the consequences of that wrong by the payment of interest on the capital of the fund. The initial wrong was consummated in 1842; the subsidiary wrong, of which we now complain, dates from 1870 and continues operative to this moment. But it is this latter wrong—that is to say, a wrong committed since the making of the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo—that we have a legal right to complain of. In the international forum the Government of the United States has no locus standi to complain of legal wrongs committed by Mexico prior to the treaty of peace. It can not lawfully make reclamation for indemnity for the act of the state against its own subjects; and even if these subjects became, subsequent to the commission of the wrong, citizens of the United States the Government of the latter can not lawfully espouse their grievance committed by their Government before they were denationalized. The reasons on which this familiar distinction of international law and practice are founded are so notorious that I beg the indulgence of the honorable tribunal for adverting to the subject. My apology is that it has been the repeated signal for the clashing of shields by our honorable opponents.

The distinguished counsel for Mexico, M. Beernaert, argued that the principle or legal conception embodied in the term “chose jugée,” or res judicata, is à presumption, a fiction; but then he adds that it is a necessary fiction. A principle which is confessedly necessary is, humanly speaking, an inexorable rule of conduct, and is therefore to be judicially observed. The necessity of the rule is its own sufficient justification.

The principal argument of our honorable opponent is predicated on three propositions: First, that the particular instalments of interest demanded in this case have not been adjudicated; second, that the object of the demand to-day is materially different from the object of the former demand, and that between the two there is wanting identity of cause or object, because, it is argued, rights or claims of interest maturing each year are successively violated, and that these violations constitute injuries to different and successive rights.

Rights spring out of obligations. They are correlative terms. The right of the beneficiaries to claim the interest in this case is founded in the identical obligation which became res judicata by the award of the mixed commission in 1875. We assert the continued existence of the obligation of Mexico which was thus adjudicated, and the exact reciprocal of that obligation is the right of the beneficiaries, which is, therefore, included in res judicata. Hence the premises on which the argument of the learned counsel was based, being themselves fallacious, the conclusion deduced from them must fail. One can not deny the right of the United States to claim this interest without attacking and denying the obligation which was solemnly adjudged, and you can not attack and deny the obligation without impeaching, reopening, rehearing, overruling, and reversing the former judgment. If one sues to recover rents, there is the premise that the plaintiff owns the house which has been let to the defendant and on which rents accrue from month to month; if one sues to recover the annual interest falling due on a mortgage, the action is based on the premise that there is a capital or principal, the amount of which must be judicially ascertained by the judgment as one of its indispensable bases.

The learned counsel also contended that it is impossible to attribute to the award of 1875 the effects of res judicata, because the conditions are subject to necessary and inevitable fluctuations. The argument was that the beneficiaries of the Pious Fund may at some future period cease to exist, and that hence the doctrine of res judicata is necessarily inapplicable.

In this transitory sphere of existence the Government and the people of Mexico may cease to exist; the Government and the people of the United States may disappear from the face of the earth, and so may the beneficiaries of the Pious Fund cease to exist at some period in the far distant future. But the two Governments and peoples do now exist; the beneficiaries do now exist, even in larger numbers in the United States than in Mexico; and the decision of the honorable tribunal is to be rendered not on the supposed facts of an imaginary case, but on the concrete facts of the case now to be decided. But such are the inconsistencies of fundamental error of reasoning inevitably involved in the position of the Mexican Government, that while the learned counsel is denying the force of res judicata in favor of the United States in this case, he reaffirms the position of Mr. Avila and invokes the doctrine of res judicata in favor of Mexico urged by the declaration in Mr. Avila’s note to the Mexican minister, which was communicated by him to the Secretary of State, that the effect of the award of the mixed commission was to adjudge and settle forever all question of the obligation of Mexico to pay interests accrued and to accrue, and affirming that the debate was finally closed. Thus in the same breath in which our honorable opponents attack the doctrine of res judicata they uphold and advance the doctrine of res judicata.

I quite concur with Monsieur Beernaert that there is a considerable difference in the formal parts of judgments rendered by the courts which administer the civil law, and those which administer the law in Great Britain and the United States. But the difference is only formal and superficial. In England and the United States a judgment formally consists, first, of the findings of the facts in issue between the parties; second, of the statement of the court applying the law to the facts; and third, of the final sentence or dispository part of the judgment. In the civil law judgment, the statements of law and fact are combined in the considerations which are followed by the final sentence. It is therefore exact to say that between the judgments rendered by the civil and common law courts, there is only a formal difference, a formal division between the grounds or “objective motives” of the decision and the dispository part of the judgment. But it is not the forms but the essence of things which the court considers. In both systems the maxim, which expresses the vitalizing reason of the rule of res judicata, is the same—namely, that it is to the interest of the commonwealth that there should be an end of litigation.

I beg pardon of the learned arbitrators if I add that what are styled the “objective motives” or grounds of the judgment include the decisive facts in the given case, and the judicial application of the law to the facts; the two forming the premises of the syllogism, the conclusion deduced from which is stated in the dispository part of the final sentence. These “objective motives” form an integral part of the judgment and they are included in the res judicata, irrespective of whether the judge was right or wrong, in finding the facts and in applying the law.

But in the common law system, the judge in the course of his opinion sometimes turns aside from the direct consideration of the case in hand, and reviews cases and precedents more or less analogous, and utters opinions, more or less relevant; but inasmuch as those opinions are given for illustration merely and are not germane to the decision, they are styled mere dicta and are without binding force either as res judicata or as precedents. As I understand the text writers, these dicta correspond to the “subjective motives” of the civil law. Monsieur Beernaert traces one by one the successive steps of the court sitting in judgment and argues that it is only when the final stage is reached, in the rendition of the final sentence, that the judge has passed to the height of public power; but, as we understand it, the judge is clothed with public power to find the decisive facts and to apply the law; he is clothed with public power to pronounce the final sentence; and therefore, to quote the language of the learned counsel, Monsieur Beernaert, “When the judge has passed to this height of public power his judgment is absolutely obligatory.”

If in attacking the juridical effects of res judicata a distinction is to be made between judgments rendered by courts of civil law and of common law, I beg leave to observe that the majority decision of the mixed commission was rendered first by the American commissioner, Mr. Wadsworth, and then by the umpire, Sir Edward Thornton, not merely in the approved form of the common-law judgment, but in the usual form of an international award, and that if the contention of our honorable opponent is sustained it would render the doctrine of res judicata absolutely inapplicable to international awards, which, in view of the susceptibilities of the contending parties, are frequently limited to the dispository part of the judgment.

In the course of his argument the learned counsel, referring to the former arbitration, said: “Show us the conclusions or memorial in which you have said, I demand not interest for twenty-one years, but forever! Show us how it could have been possible for the judge to decide upon this demand which you have never made.”

The obligation of Mexico to pay interest is evidenced and declared by her own laws. It was so adjudged by the commission. Then, I answer, show us how and when that obligation to pay annual interest was ever extinguished. Will our honorable opponents plead and attempt to vindicate before this tribunal any subsequent act of confiscation?

I beg the indulgence of the court while I suggest “a subjective motive,” an individual opinion of my own, a reason why that obligation to pay annual interest has not been extinguished. On February 17, 1834, a convention was celebrated between Spain and the United States whereby the United States agreed to cancel the claims of its citizens for injuries sustained from the captures and condemnations of their vessels and cargoes by the agents of the Spanish Government during the wars growing out of the insurrection of its American colonies. It was agreed that the claims amounted in value to $600,000, and it was further agreed that Spain, instead of paying the amount of the claims, should inscribe the same upon the great book of the consolidated debt of Spain and pay perpetual rents thereon at the rate of five per cent per annum, and that the Government of the United States should make distribution of the rents thus paid among its citizens equitably entitled thereto. Instead of making compensation in money for the confiscation of property, Spain undertook to pay perpetual rents thereon. If during the period of twenty-one years following the date of that treaty the Spanish Government had refused to pay those rents and the question of its obligation to do so had been submitted to an international tribunal which had awarded the payment of those rents during the twenty-one years, would it be argued that upon a subsequent default and submission of the case to international arbitration, the Government of the United States would be compelled to try anew the whole transaction? Or could it not properly invoke the application of the principle of res judicata, the obligation which had been adjudicated in the one case being precisely the same obligation which gave rise to the claim sued on in the second case? I suggest this case as an illustration, as a “subjective motive,” and not as an “objective motive” for the decision of the case now before this tribunal.

Finally the learned counsel frankly admits that the motives or grounds of the decision do have a certain importance, and may be considered in order to determine the meaning of the dispository part of the judgment and to give to it its veritable consequence. The language thus used appears vague. It is necessary to define. What is meant by “giving to the judgment its veritable consequence?” I regret that the learned counsel fails to illustrate with the light of his clear mind the scope or meaning of the phrase—the veritable effects of the judgment. The judgment and the meaning of the judgment are one and the same thing. What party should inquire as to the meaning of the judgment? Why ask the question? For what purpose? Cui bono? To ask the question is to answer it.

But in the armor of Achilles was found one vulnerable point; and the keen eye of the honorable counsel has detected one, just one point, which he finds vulnerable in the armor of chose jugée. The point is said to consist in the absence of identity of objects of the two suits; and this armor is said to be open because the first suit was for twentyone annuities and the present suit is for thirty-three annuities; or in other words, because the former judgment failed to decree the perpetuity of the right, so as to include, as parts of one whole, the interest already accrued and the interest not yet accrued and not yet demandable.

Sir Edward Fry. Is it not 33 years, Mr. Solicitor?

Mr. McEnerny. Thirty-three years is right.

Mr. Penfield. I am quoting from Mr. Beernaert, if the honorable arbitrator please, and he said the first suit was for 21 annuities and the present suit is for 32 annuities. In fact it is for 33, but of course it is unimportant.

Sir Edward Fry. Yes, it is unimportant, but I thought it was 33.

Mr. Penfield. It is unimportant for the purposes of the argument.

With respect to this statement of the honorable counsel there appears to be a want of precision in point of fact and a misconception in point of law.

The memorial in the former case charged that “in pursuance of the decree for the sale and capitalization of the property made by the provisional president of said Republic, dated October 24, 1842, the said Republic of Mexico by the same decree undertook and promised to pay interest on said capital at the rate of six per cent per annum, thenceforth;” this is the language of the memorial; and the word “thenceforth” unqualified and unlimited, includes all time and asserts the perpetuity of the obligation. The umpire, in his decision (Transcript, pages 607, 608), decided that the Spanish Government became the trustee of the fund, avowedly with all the duties and obligations attached to it; that Mexico succeeded to the trust and declared that the assumption by the Government of the care and administration of the Pious Fund was for the express purpose of scrupulously carrying out the objects proposed by the founders, and those objects were eternal in their nature. In point of fact then this question was submitted and it was adjudged by the umpire that the obligation was perpetual in its nature. In this connection I would refer also to the brief of Mr. Doyle on p. 14 and to Mr. Avila’s statement (Transcript, p. 640, section 156).

In point of law, a judgment for the recovery of installments of interest or of rents due has the effect of establishing the right of recovery of subsequent rents or interests falling due on the obligation, the existence, nature, and amount of the obligation having been judicially established. The actions may be successive and multiple in form, but they are not different in their essential juridical character, for each and every such right of action successively sued on is dependent on the same obligation and there is therefore absolute identity of objects in the successive suits.

In this connection, I cite Chand on “Res Judicata,” section 28, page 40, which says that “the identity of the matter at issue will apply even when the subject-matter, the object, the relief, and the cause of action are different.” And he says, on page 46, that if the claimant is defeated by a judgment which negatives his title, he “can not reagitate the same question of title by suing to obtain relief for a subsequent item of the obligation.” On pages 50 and 51, the text is to the effect that res judicata is not defeated by à change in the form of the action; and at the foot of page 55, he states that res judicata covers points which are essential to the former judgment.

Our opponents have exclaimed with some vehemence against what they denominate “perpetual rents, perpetual servitude of Mexico—the shirt of Nessus, which can not be divested.” Thus their minds, like Mr. Avila’s, confess the veritable effects of the judgment while their words combat their inmost thought. The diplomatic correspondence (appendix to transcript, p. 50) shows that the United States ambassador to Mexico was instructed July 18, 1901, by Secretary Hay, to suggest, or bring about, an offer to settle the matter by a compromise once for all of the entire claim. The door has been open for a final compromise and settlement of the annual interests or perpetual rents, as our honorable opponents style them, and Mexico has never responded in any sense to the offer. The Government of the United States has not only been just, but it has even been generous, to Mexico, as is demonstrated by its action in the Weil and La Abra cases. Is this the shirt of Nessus?

I lay down on this branch of the argument in reply the following propositions:

• First: An international award has the force of res judicata.
• Second: It includes all the objective motives or grounds on which the final sentence is predicated. Thus it includes as many distinct judgments as there are essential bases of law and fact which are implied in the final sentence, just as the conclusion of à syllogism impliedly and necessarily includes the major and minor premises. In reaching à judgment we must reason, and we can reason only according to the forms and laws of thought. We therefore proceed step by step, from premise to premise, of fact and law, to the conclusion, which is the formal statement of the ultimate truth deduced from the premises, both of which must be true. The judgment, therefore, includes the decisory part and all the organic parts, and constitutes in fact so many distinct judgments which are summed up and denominated judgment just as all races of men are summed up and denominated in a single word, “man.”

In support of these propositions I refer to the authorities cited in the memorandum filed on behalf of the United States, pages 49–54, and to the replication, page 4, and notes on page 7.

In the light of the foregoing propositions, what was adjudged, what was established by the award of the Mixed Commission?

First, that in point of fact the Mexican Government in 1842 had in its possession a certain sum of money, the amount of which was fixed by the award. Second, that, as à mixed question of law and fact, Mexico was under an obligation to pay annual interest thenceforth on said sum at the rate of six per cent. Third, that in point of fact, the instalments of interest accruing from 1848 to 1869 were due and unpaid by the Government of Mexico. Fourth, that in point of fact, the Government of the United States had sued Mexico, demanding the payment of this interest which had accrued; and that as a mixed question of law and fact, the former Government had been injured by the nonpayment of that interest, and so was entitled to claim it for the use of its injured citizens, whose cause it had espoused and made its own.

All the constituent elements of the judgment, all the “identities” mentioned by Monsieur Beernaert, are here, namely, identity of parties and of capacities in which the parties sue and are sued, namely, the Government of the United States and the Government of Mexico; identity of the cause, that is to say, of the obligation of Mexico to give to the United States for its citizens the enjoyment of their withheld property rights; and identity of demand and decision, namely, for the amount due and unpaid, which results from a mere arithmetical computation, all the elements of which are included in the judgment. Id certum est quod reddi certum potest. Therefore the bases of the present claim were judicially considered and determined; not less so than if the mixed commission had formally so adjudged on each particular proposition. The mixed commission in 1875 could not have rendered the final award it did, unless the Government of the United States had sued the Government of Mexico, and unless the commission had adjudged that the United States had been injured by Mexico. The mixed commission could not have adjudged that injury and the extent of that injury without adjudging the perpetual obligation and the amount of interest falling due each year and the aggregate amount thereof accrued and unpaid from 1818 to 1869; and it could not have adjudged the amount of interest falling due each year without ascertaining and adjudging the amount of the capital and the rate of interest it bore.

As to the effects of each of these particular judgments we invoke the application of the principle of res judicata. As between the two Governments the question of the amount of the capital, the rate of interest it bears, the amount of the instalment falling due annually, and the obligation of the Mexican Government to pay, and the right of the United States Government to claim it, are judicially settled forever.

In the “Conclusions” filed on behalf of Mexico by MM. Beernaert and Delacroix it is alleged that the principle of res judicata can not be applied in this case, because the award in 1875 emanated from à mixed commission, clothed only with an arbitral authority, and that the power of the arbitrators, proceeding only from the consent of the parties, is limited by the private mandate from which it emanates, and therefore can not constitute à former adjudication.

The effect of this contention is, in short, to deny to the principle of res judicata any application whatever to international arbitration; and, as has been shown by Mr. Ralston, it is in conflict with the general consensus of opinion of publicists of recognized authority. The denial of the application of the doctrine to international awards would indeed deprive the law of nations of one of its most fruitful and beneficent principles and would be most detrimental to the development of that law, and to the fostering and preservation of the peaceful relations of States which that law is intended to promote.

What, then, is implied by the submission of a case to international arbitration? Are the parties at liberty to attack the award after they have granted full jurisdiction to the tribunal to render it? Do they not consent in advance to accept the award, and not merely to accept it, but also to accept all the judicial consequences which attach to it? Those consequences are as much a part of the award as are the fundamental bases on which it is predicated. The award, then, is to have its complete juridical effects, and its payment is only one of these effects. If the contention now under consideration should unfortunately be upheld by this honorable tribunal, then it would logically follow that if the Mixed Commission had decided in the former case against the United States the latter would have been at once at liberty to bring fresh suit for the very same interest which formed the subject of the first litigation, and in the second litigation it could plead, if it had already been announced, the principle which you are now asked by Mexico to declare.

The application of the principle in this case is appropriate, and we invoke it because you are expressly authorized to apply it, and because it is just, and because the principle operates reciprocally, and is equally binding upon each party, whether winning or losing. I will not trespass upon the indulgence of the honorable tribunal by restating at length or reviewing the authorities already cited; but, in order to illustrate the theme, let us suppose that the award of the umpire had been in favor of Mexico and against the United States. The Government of the United States would not again have presented that claim, or the one now sued on, convinced that the question of liability was settled by that decision; but, if we may suppose à case so highly improbable as that the United States had again brought forward the former claim or the present claim, and if it were submitted under the present protocol, let us conceive what would be the position of the Mexican Government. Would it not have contended that the question of liability had been forever settled in favor of Mexico? Would it have contended that the matters then in issue and decided were open for rehearing? If the present Mexican contention is valid it destroys the vital principle of res judicata, or, rather, there is no such principle, which is then reduced to the bare statement of the simple fact that it was once adjudged that a certain sum of money was or was not owing between certain parties. If the contention is valid the statements and expositions of the principle contained in so many of the text-books and decisions are simply meaningless verbiage. The judgment of a court, like the conclusion of a syllogism, rests upon premises, without which there can be no conclusion, and consequently no judgment. The argument of our honorable opponents, therefore, proves too much, since if it proves anything it is that no judgment was ever rendered. The argument, however, when reduced to its last analysis, is simply in effect a direct attack upon the award for alleged error of the umpire in his appreciation of the law and the facts.

We invoke the application of the principle, therefore, even though, as shown by the evidence now before the court, the award would be for a less sum than we are justly entitled to recover. But it is vastly more important in its influence upon international law, and therefore upon the well being of states, that upon this occasion, when this honorable tribunal will, for the first time in the history of nations, solemnly determine the judicial effects of an international award, that the far-reaching decision should be in accord with sound academic principles, illustrating not merely the maxim of the municipal courts that it is to the interest of the state that there should be an end of litigation of the same questions, but that interest gentibus omnibus ut inter civitates omnes sit finis litium—it is to the interest of the peace and welfare of all races that between all nations there should be an end of controversy.

In the eloquent plea of the counsel who opened the case for Mexico, Monsieur Delacroix, it was said that “there are no missions, that there could not be any, on the free soil of America; no more in the United States of America, where liberty of conscience is to-day complete and entire, than in Mexico to-day would it be any longer possible to establish these works of reduction or of religious conquest than of political conquest.”

While I concur in the statement of the learned counsel that in the United States of America liberty of conscience is complete, and that there is entire freedom of religious faith and worship, the conclusion deduced therefrom is in fact and in reason strangely at variance with the large truth contained in the general proposition. For there the Greek Catholic has consecrated his church; there the Mormon his temple; there the Anglican, the German Lutheran, the Dutch Reformed, the Mennonite, the Presbyterian, and a multitude of other sects and religions have consecrated places of worship of the Supreme Being; and there each sect, according to its means and resources, is engaged in the propagation of its faith; and there, in the complete separation of church and state, flourishing and advancing, building new churches and hospitals and schools, in which the teachings of the humanities are tempered with the teachings of piety, the Roman Catholic Church maintains its missions and founds new ones, not only in cities—in New York, in Chicago, in San Francisco—but in the villages and pueblos and among the aborigines in the wilderness.

We are not concerned here, as the honorable counsel has suggested, with the question of the revision of history, but with its illuminating instruction in the judicial interpretation of the decisive facts of this case; and happily for mankind it is no longer possible to fan into fresh flames the buried and extinct embers of the conflagration of the passions which from the 16th to the 19th centuries spread over Western Europe; and little could it enlighten the issues here to inquire whether the Jesuits ought to have been maintained or expelled.

Far be it from us to stain the memory of the King of Spain by ascribing to him greed for their riches as the motive for the expulsion of the Jesuits; least of all could such motive be justified in this presence, in an age of equal laws, when the present and future prosperity and happiness of all peoples depend on the protection of private right.

The expulsion of the Jesuits, as demonstrated by the decree of the King of Spain, originated not in rapacity nor in hostility to the Roman Catholic religion, nor to the will of the founders of the missions. Political, not mercenary, the motives undoubtedly were; but the final consequences of arbitrary injury inflicted upon private property right are to be judged by the accomplished fact; and we are to ascertain and interpret the juridical effects attached to the fact, and which were acknowledged both by the Crown of Spain and by the Government of Mexico.

It does not seem fitting before this tribunal to follow the eloquent counsel in the discussion of the events which led up to and which signalized and followed the French Revolution and the Franco-Prussian war. Such discussion would be barren here; and it does not seem opportune to distract attention from the issues of the concrete case before this honorable tribunal.

Every case is to be decided on its own facts, not upon the assumed facts of an imaginary case called analogous. Does it accord with the scientific spirit of research after truth to speak of a supposed analogy as complete, without previous full investigation and an exact statement of all the facts of the supposed case? At the close of the Franco-Prussian war a fine was imposed upon the losing party to meet the costs of the victor. At the close of the Mexican war, not only was no fine imposed, on the contrary, the United States paid to Mexico the sum of $15,000,000 for the purchase of the ceded territory, and the two States stipulated, in the last clause of Article 8 of the treaty of peace, that “property of every kind, now belonging to Mexicans not established there, shall be inviolably respected. The present owners, (and) the heirs of these, shall enjoy with respect to it guaranties equally ample as if the same belonged to citizens of the United States.”

These persons are, therefore, entitled to claim all the guaranties of the Federal Constitution.

In respect of their property rights, they were placed on à plane of equality in all respects with native-born citizens of the United States.

And the high contracting parties further stipulate in article 9 of the treaty that “the Mexicans who in the (ceded) territories aforesaid shall not preserve the character of citizens of the Mexican Republic” * * * “shall be incorporated into the Union of the United States and be admitted at the proper time (to be judged of by the Congress of the United States) to the enjoyment of all the rights of citizens of the United States according to the principles of the Constitution; and in the meantime they shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their property.” Our honorable opponents contend that that meant property only situated within the territorial jurisdiction of the two States. On the contrary, the duty was imposed upon the Government of the United States to protect all rights of property of every description which might accrue to these denationalized Mexican citizens, and the benefit of the covenant runs not only to those persons but to their heirs in the United States; if, therefore, any foreign government not a party to the treaty should thereafter injure any of the property rights of these citizens or of their successors in interest by denying to them the enjoyment of those rights by withholding payment of an established fiduciary or pecuniary obligation, the Government of the United States is bound by that treaty to protect and vindicate those rights. Is that engagement any less binding between the parties themselves? Does it stipulate that Mexico shall be at liberty to deny the enjoyment to those property rights by withholding the property itself? If an exception is not contained in the treaty, then, under the covenants of the treaty as well as upon the principles of international law, the Government of the United States owes, in return for the duty of allegiance of its citizens, the reciprocal duty of protection to the citizens and to their legitimate successors in interest in respect to the denial of any right of enjoyment of property that might thereafter be injuriously withheld from them. That it owed that duty to the then bishops was solemnly adjudged by the umpire. Does it not owe the same duty to their successors?

The honorable counsel for Mexico inquired: What is the law which it is necessary to apply in this case? And the solution proposed for this question was in effect this:

• First. That this is not an international but a private arbitration between citizens of the United States and the Government of Mexico, because the Government of the United States sues simply in behalf of the prelates of the church in California.
• Second. That this honorable tribunal has been delegated, or substituted, to sit in the place and stead of the Mexican tribunals, adopting the same rules and principles which would have governed their decisions.

The character of this proposition, which I can not believe will find acceptance, challenges a moment’s consideration. If this rule were adopted by international tribunals it would strike at the very root of international arbitration, and would defeat one of the prime objects of the Hague Convention. We complain here of a denial of justice. A state may deny justice in many different modes to the subjects of another state. It may do so by the arbitrary imprisonment of their persons or by the confiscation of their property. It may do so by the final decision of à court of last resort. In short, a denial of justice includes any arbitrary wrong or injury committed by the supreme authorities of one state upon the personal or property rights of the subject of another state. If the view put forward by M. Delacroix were adopted in respect of denials of justice, resulting in international intervention and arbitration, what would be the predicament of the offended government and of its injured citizens if an arbitral tribunal were simply substituted in place of the local tribunals which denied justice? Is this honorable court bound to sit in the place and stead of, and to adopt the same rules and principles as, the local tribunals by which justice had been finally denied? If so, why should a government intervene in any case? Why arbitrate what has already been conclusively determined? To state the question is to answer it.

The contention of the honorable counsel, moreover, does not appear to be in harmony with the well settled principles of international law.

Vattel and the European publicists in general lay down the doctrine that the State which intervenes in behalf of its injured subject makes the cause its own, and the controversy is thereafter waged between the offended and the offending States. This lawsuit is, therefore, one between the United States and Mexico. It is the sovereign who sues, and he represents collectively all his subjects. The United States Government has intervened and represents all its citizens who have been injured by the non-payment of the debt sued for. A government may intervene sua sponte, as governments have done in the past, under circumstances of flagrant injury to its subjects and of offense to the national honor. It may, without the petition or suggestion of any of its citizens, demand immediate apology, reparation and compensation in respect of those who have been injured.

The State, by its very act of intervention and submission of the cause to arbitration, cancels the particular claim of any and of all of its subjects against the offending State, for an injury committed; and when the indemnity is collected, the sovereign, or, in this case, the President, acting through the Secretary of State, will make the distribution in accordance with the principles of international law and with the exalted spirit of equity, to whoever of its citizens may be ultimately entitled. This was done with respect to the moneys paid on the former award, the evidence of which is before the court. The question, therefore, who or what claimant appeared before the Department of State, or whether any claimant appeared at all or not, is not a question before this court. If we establish by proofs the injury to citizens of the United States and the Government of the United States takes up that case as its own, you can only determine whether the United States Government is entitled to a recovery in the suit.

This, then, is an international, not a private, arbitration. The whole people of the United States, on the one hand, and of Mexico on the other, represented by the agents of the sovereign authority, are before the court; and unless, as we contend, the principle of res judicata governs the decision, the court will have then to decide whether the claim is valid upon principles of international law and of justice.

The view on which the contention of the learned counsel for Mexico is based is announced in the work of à celebrated publicist, Mr. Charles Calvo, a writer for whose great erudition and for whose large and valuable compilation we are all greatly indebted, and of whom I could only speak with the most profound respect before any tribunal. Mr. Calvo, however, was born and reared in a State or continent whose controversies have been the subject of serious consideration by the publicists, and some of the principles declared by Mr. Calvo may properly be considered in the light of the surroundings and environments in which he was bred. He lays it down in substance as a principle that the state is absolutely sovereign with respect to its internal affairs, and that no other state has any right to intervene for any cause whatever. In its aspect as à political maxim, it is not proper in this case and place to consider it. But in its aspect as a declared principle of international law, applicable to intervention for the protection of the right of the injured subjects of a foreign state, most unfortunate would it be for the cause of justice in the western world if that should be incorporated as a principle into the law of nations. If that contention is consecrated as a principle, it ends, once for all, all right of a state to protect its subjects against denials of justice—of whatever kind—committed by one state upon the nationals of another state; and the abandonment of the duty of protection of its subjects by the state forfeits its right to their allegiance.

I have in mind, and with the indulgence of the court I will state, a concrete case which strikingly illustrates the workings of the principle underlying the contention of the honorable counsel, and which was announced by Mr. Calvo.

A revolution had broken out in an American state. A military chieftain, acting under the direction of the supreme authority of the state, seized and confiscated the movables of a United States citizen, not because the citizen had been guilty of lawless or unneutral conduct, but solely and simply for military uses. The citizen appealed to his government to secure an indemnity. A local law authorized the seizure of the property and provided that the military commanders seizing property for such uses must give a voucher showing the property taken, fixing its value, and that the claim for compensation therefor must be presented, within à short period, before the local tribunals, and that the local tribunals must take such voucher as conclusive proof of the value of the property taken; and the law further provided that the claimant who should refuse to accept the voucher tendered by the military officer or should refuse to present his claim within the limited time before the local tribunals should forfeit his claim. The officer was thus clothed with power of confiscation, and in the case now under mention he tendered a voucher to the citizen showing only one-fourth of the fair market value of the property taken. The Secretary of State presented the claim diplomatically and requested the payment of a reasonable indemnity. The request was refused, and the ground put forward for the refusal was that the property had been taken under the direction of the head of the state, and pursuant to local law; that every state is absolutely sovereign with respect to its internal affairs, and that a local law prohibited any foreigner from applying to his government to intervene for his protection, and on these grounds it was argued that the United States could not properly intervene, and the claim was rejected.

If the contention made by the learned counsel for Mexico were to be adopted and to govern the relations of the State to its subjects sojourning in a foreign land, then, in the words of a distinguished statesman, the supreme authorities of one State may lawfully swing up by the heels the innocent subject of another State and bastinado him as he swings, and his Government is powerless to protect him. His only recourse is to the local tribunals, whose rule of decision in denial of justice has been prescribed in advance by the local laws.

In this connection another defence interposed by our honorable opponents is that the claim is barred by the statute of limitations.

In point of fact this contention is by the terms of the protocol excluded from your consideration. Our answer is that one State can not by its statutes bind another State in denial of justice. It is the State which sues here. If it had been contemplated to raise this defence, then, on the principles which govern the relations of friendly States, it should have been so expressed in the protocol.

Our position in respect to this contention is stated in Mr. McEnerney’s brief, pages 56-58, to which I respectfully refer the honorable court.

I beg leave, however, to add that the bringing forward of the contention at the present stage of the case comes to us in the nature of a surprise. It was not disclosed or even remotely suggested in the course of the negotiations between the two Governments, as will appear from the diplomatic correspondence. The only objections made by Mr. Mariscal were that the case did not fall within the governing principle of res judicata and that the claim was not just. It was contemplated between the two States that in the submission of the cause to international arbitration, it should be lifted above all technicalities and decided solely upon the ground, not whether the statute of limitations can be pleaded against the juridical effects of a former judgment, but upon the broad ground whether the adjudication of the facts and liability in the former case was such as properly to control the determination of the facts and liability in this case, and if not, whether the claim be just.

Our honorable opponents lay stress on the decision made in the case of Nobile vs. Redman. In our view, that decision can not determine the present case, because.

• First, the decision was rendered by an inferior court and the Supreme Court of the United States, in another case, has held otherwise.
• Second, in the case now before this honorable tribunal, there is not involved any question of the capacity of the claimants to sue; for the Government of the United States represents here all its citizens, in all of their legal capacities to sue; whether natural or juridical; whether corporations, public or private, lay or ecclesiastic.

I refer in this connection to Transcript, pages 589–593, 599 and 600.

The protocol submits to the determination of the honorable arbitrators the decision of the question of the amount of the award and the currency in which it should be payable. It is contended in the “conclusions” that the payment of the award in gold, formerly à matter of indifference, would be to-day ruinous for Mexico; that the Mexican standard is exclusively silver; that it was in this money that the State received the proceeds of the sale; and that it should remit only a part of what it has received and as it has received it.

If the whole case is not controlled by the force of the principles of res judicata this question will then be determined by the honorable tribunal in the light of those considerations which are just and equitable between the parties, and consonant with the reputation, credit, and dignity of the litigant States. In the absence of evidence showing in what currency the proceeds of the sales were paid to Mexico by the purchasers of the properties, we are not at liberty to assume whether the payments were made in gold or silver, or both, but the depreciation of silver in comparison with gold during the last thirty years is à matter of public notoriety, of which the court will take judicial notice.

It was indeed, as stated in the “conclusions,” a matter of comparative indifference whether the award of 1875 was payable in gold or silver; but since that date the depreciation has been such that the commercial value of silver has decreased comparatively to less than one-half of its former value, and is now approximately only forty per cent of what it was in 1870. This depreciation can not be imputed as a fault to either Government, and is not, therefore, a consideration which should properly influence the judgment of the court, by making the nominal amount of the award worth 150 per cent more than its actual value in the money markets of the world. On the other hand, the purchasing value of either a dollar of gold or of silver has greatly depreciated during the last sixty years, and if measured by its purchasing value, the capital of the Pious Fund, as actually realized by Mexico, far exceeds its present nominal sum.

The generally accepted standard of exchange among the civilized nations is gold, and in an international tribunal would, in the absence of an expressed stipulation to the contrary, naturally be adopted as the medium in which the award should be payable. Among the equitable considerations which may justly influence the judgment of the court, it is not improper to refer to the precedent set by the action of the Government of the United States, as indicating at least its conception of what is due to the national honor. And in this connection I refer to the La Abra and Weil cases.

The Mixed Commission created under the convention of July 4, 1869, rendered awards in two cases known as the “Weil” and “La Abra Silver Mining” claims, which together amounted to the sum of $1,130,506.55. Mexico petitioned the Government of the United States to set aside those awards on the alleged ground that the Commission had been wickedly deceived by fabricated and perjured testimony adduced by the claimants. Upon strict principles of municipal law, Mexico was not justified in asking for a reopening of the awards; for she had not been free from laches in presenting to the tribunal even the evidence which she already had in her possession showing the fraud, of which she had notice before the trials were closed; but immediately following the rendition of the awards the Mexican Government, while conceding their binding force, began a diplomatic attack on the justice of the awards, and thereafter submitted a large volume of evidence in support of her charges to the Secretary of State.

The President finally recommended to Congress the passage of a law conferring upon the Court of Claims of the United States, sitting in the District of Columbia, jurisdiction to hear and determine the charges. Actions were brought before the court, were prosecuted by official legal counsel employed by the Government of the United States and wholly at its expense. The result was a decree in each case, sustaining the charges which had been preferred by the Mexican Government, and the decisions rendered by the lower court were affirmed on appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States. Then, without any request or suggestion on the part of Mexico, the United States, sua sponte, refunded to the Mexican Government, in United States gold, the total amount of the two awards, although there had already been paid out and distributed by the United States Government among the individual claimants under these awards a sum exceeding a half a million dollars. Therefore the Government of the United States stands to lose more than half a million dollars, which, having been distributed twenty years ago among the claimants and their attorneys, are beyond recovery in the courts on account of the death of some of the claimants and the insolvency of their estates, and the legal difficulties of recovering from the attorneys moneys paid to them and honestly received by them through their faith in the integrity of their clients.

If the Government of the United States had seen fit to stand on narrow grounds, it might well have said, if it had adopted the view now put forward in the “conclusions” that inasmuch as when the awards were rendered it was a matter of comparative indifference to Mexico whether she paid them in gold or silver; and inasmuch as during the last thirty years there has been so great depreciation in silver, and inasmuch as the United States has been an innocent loser in so large a sum, and inasmuch as Mexico has adopted a silver standard, the United States may and will refund to Mexico in the standard of her own currency. If the contention made in the “conclusions” is to be sustained, then the United States Government, having refunded to Mexico in United States gold, has refunded a sum amounting to nearly $3,000,000, measured by the standard of the Mexican currency; and thus Mexico on the face of her own contention has accepted more than she would be thereon entitled to receive by nearly two millions of dollars, while on the other hand, she is asking this honorable tribunal to award to the United States less than one-half of what Mexico owes.

I now conclude my argument with the final proposition that the contention now brought forward by Mexico that the claim under consideration is barred by the statute of limitations; the contention that the claimants ought to have resorted to the local tribunals; the contention that the numbers of the beneficiaries of the Pious Fund are varying from year to year; the contention that the award of Sir Edward Thornton was erroneous; the contention that the doctrine of res judicata can not be invoked against a sovereign, all these and all similar contentions of Mexico have been excluded from your consideration by the terms of the protocol, namely, is the case within the governing principle of res judicata; if not, is the claim just.

The justice of a decision is tried, not merely by the language and reasons of the opinion given, but by the effect of the decree. Does it do justice in the case between the parties; and does it also tend to exalt the general principle of justice?

Mexico, upon the facts taken from her own records, has appropriated a fund, the principal of which amounts to more than $1,700,000. It can not be shown, upon the careful reading and interpretation of any treaty stipulation, that Mexico has ever been discharged or released from the obligation to pay the interest which has accrued since 1869. National obligations, whether acknowledged by statute or presidential decree, or by a written promise to pay, are, in the last analysis, reduced to the same juristic term. It is a difference of formula not of things. And whether evidenced by its bonds, by its statutes or decrees, or under whatever other solemn form, the duty of the State to discharge its obligations, fiduciary and pecuniary, to the subjects of another State, is settled by the law and practice of nations. The fact that the obligation may have inured, in part, to beneficiaries in the Republic of Mexico, and in part to those in the United States, subsequent to the treaty of 1848 between the two States, could not affect the validity of the obligation, the payment of whch is asked by the United States, simply because it is just and because in this presence, where, all nations stand equal, that nation alone is mighty which is superior by its moral right.

In closing, I beg to express our grateful appreciation for the most patient and indulgent attention which the representatives of the Government of the United States, the claimants, and their counsel have received from the honorable tribunal, as well as for the many valued services and courtesies rendered by the distinguished secretary-general, the first secretary, and the other officers of the court; and also to express our sense of the kindly consideration which we have all received at the hands of the distinguished representatives and counsel of the Republic of Mexico.

Although they are momentary adversaries before this tribunal, yet through the solution of the controversy afforded by the recourse to this high court, the friendly relations that unite the two litigant States remain undisturbed and have even been strengthened by the mutual forbearance, courtesy, and respect shown throughout all their negotiations; and it is the ardent hope and firm belief of the United States that the two nations will continue to be united by the close and enduring ties of common sympathies and reciprocal friendship.

M. Beernaert. Messieurs, M. Penfield vient de me faire l’honneur d’une réplique, qui, je n’en doute pas, est extremêment sérieuse, mais qu’à raison de ma connaissance imparfaitede la langue anglaise je n’ai que très insuffisamment saisie. Il est de mon devoir d’y répondre. Je ne pourrai le faire qu’en me faisant rendre compte d’après la sténographic de ce que je n’ai pas saisi. Je prie done la cour de bien vouloir remettre les répliques à demain; très probablement M. Descamps et moi pourrons nous contenter de deux à trois heures et par conséquent d’une seule audience.

Judge Penfield. At the request of Mr. Ralston I desire to reserve five minutes this afternoon.

Mr. Ralston. We will ourselves be ready to proceed by half-past two.

M. le Président. Le tribunal, après avoir dé1ibéré, à décidé de continuer ses séances.

M. Beernaert. La cour me permettra de lui faire remarquer que dans ce cas une bonne partie de ce qu’a dit M. Penfield demeurera nécessairement sans réponse. Qu’elle me permette de lui faire remarquer qu’il y a là un précédent important au point devue de cette jurisdiction internationale: du moment que l’on autorise l’emploi de différentes langues, il est indispensable que les avocats des deux parties puissent se comprendre. Je demande une remise à demain, qui ne prolongera assurément pas les débats puisque je viens de dire que nous serons assez bref s l’un et l’autre.

(Le tribunal se retire pour délibérer.)

M. le Président. Le tribunal, ensuite de la promesse formelle des conseils des Etats-Unis du Mexique definir leurs dupliques demain mercredi, s’ajourne à demain 10 heures du matin. Le tribunal décide en outre que M. Penfield peut faire tout de suite les observations qu’il a à présenter au nom de M. Ralston.

Mr. Ralston. I do not think Mr. Penfield has understood what was said (in French).

M. de Martens. Mr. Penfield may make observations in the name of Mr. Ralston. He may make these observations now.

Mr. Penfield. In the course of his speech M. Delacroix said, referring to the opinion of the umpire, and to be found at page 606 of the transcript:

This honorable umpire said in commencing, I can not examine all these arguments. Perhaps, adds Mr. Delacroix, he was not a jurisconsult. I am ignorant of the fact, but at all events he has not examined the arguments, but he goes on to tell us upon what he has founded his conviction.

M. Beernaert, in his turn, said, referring to the umpire, that his decision was scarcely juridical; that it was scarcely complete; that the sentence opens by this: He recognizes that he is not a jurisconsult. He declares himself powerless to discuss and to examine the considerations which have been submitted to him, and then he judges according to his personal appreciation of them and to his conscience.

Both of the gentlemen have fallen into à great error, caused by apparent misunderstanding of the true meaning of the language used by the umpire. The umpire simply stated that it was impossible for him to discuss the various arguments which had been put forward on each side, and in effect said that he could only give the conclusions at which he had arrived after a careful and lengthy study of the documents submitted to him. (In respect of arguments, I am afraid that this court will be in a worse predicament than the umpire. We have been talking away now for ten days.) These documents, of course, included the arguments. He did not for a moment say that he was not a jurisconsult. He was, as we understand it, a publicist. Such a statement would have been superfluous, and, as we all know, in addition, would have been erroneous, as he was a jurisconsult of acknowledged ability and celebrity. The simple fact was that there had been submitted to him in all for decision about one thousand cases, many of them involving intricate questions of law and fact, and from the very pressure of time he was unable to present the details of the reasons or “motifs” of his decisions, and only gave in his opinion in this case, as well as in many others, what might fairly be regarded as the “dispositif;” that is to say, the conclusions at which he had arrived, based upon a lengthy consideration of the “motifs” or reasons adduced before him.

Moreover, the representatives of Mexico have fallen into a serious error in their understanding of the statement made by Messrs. Ralston and Siddons, and to be found at length on page 32 of the replication and page 52 of the Diplomatic Correspondence. This error was undoubtedly occasioned by the fact that Sr. Mariscal only quoted in the answer of Mexico disconnected sentences. Examination of the full citation will show that the contention of Messrs. Ralston and Siddons simply amounted to this: That the fund had always been in the hands of trustess, first, the Jesuits, next the Spanish Crown, then the Government of Mexico, then the bishop under the law of 1836, then again in the Mexican Republic; that the change of trusteeship was in every case accomplished by the act of the sovereign, and not that the sovereign had a right to, or had, in fact, confiscated for its own benefit the fund itself. It is a well-known principle in English and American law that the appointment and removal of trustees is within the power of the sovereign, this power ordinarily being exercised through the courts, but not necessarily so. There has, therefore, been no recognition of any sovereign fight to confiscate the proceeds of the fund, but merely a recognition of the right of the sovereign to change the trustee, the trustee in the present case being changed by the sovereign itself assuming that position.

(Le tribunal s’ajourne à mercredi le 1 octobre à 10 heures.)