questions;* and with a view to secure uniformity of decisions by the government. The first printed edition was issued in 1866, and was distributed among the officers of the War, State, and Navy Departments, and has been in use down to the present time. A request for a new edition has induced the author to add it to the present publication, with the subject matter of which it is closely connected. * The office of Solicitor of the War Department was created by Statute 20 February, 1863, Chap. 44, Sect. 3. The author was appointed Solicitor under this act at the time of its passage. Although he resigned his office when the war was over (in April, 1865), and the law which established it was not repealed until the passage of the act of 28th July, 1866, no successor was ever appointed. WAR CLAIMS AGAINST THE UNITED STATES. THE inhabitants of countries involved in domestic or civil war are liable to suffer injuries to their property and to their persons by the military operations of both belligerents. Whether they have legal claims to indemnification for losses sustained by them depends upon their political status, as defined and recognized by the law of nations, or by treaties, or by the constitutions and laws of the community with which they have been associated. In order to discern with more clearness the political relations of the claimants to the government, it should be observed that our citizens, when carrying on war against a foreign enemy, differ widely from rebels in arms against their lawful government as to their respective rights and liabilities, as defined by international or belligerent law and by the constitution and laws of the United States. Rebels in civil war, if allowed the rights of belligerents, are not entitled to all the privileges usually accorded to foreign enemies. An alien enemy is a public enemy; but a (331) public enemy may not be an alien enemy. As the rightful authority of our government over its rebellious subjects, who have become public enemies, is far greater than it would be over alien enemies, it is not wise or prudent, in the present condition of our country, to surrender or to underrate that authority. Of persons who now demand indemnity there are two classes: 1st, Those whose property has been used, captured, or destroyed by rebel armies; and, 2d, Those who have suffered similar injuries by the military operations of the national forces. That the political relations of this second class to the general government may be more distinctly defined, it will be found convenient to arrange these claimants in the following order: 1. Loyal citizens of the United States domiciled in the loyal States. 2. Disloyal citizens of the United States who have given aid and comfort to the rebellion, although they have retained their domicile in the loyal States. 3. Loyal citizens of the United States domiciled in the Confederate States. 4. Disloyal citizens of the United States domiciled in the Confederate States, being such as have aided or favored the rebellion, or such as have remained noncombatants. 5. Aliens, within the United States, owing allegiance to a foreign government. Claims to compensation for injuries inflicted on aliens during the rebellion will be the subject of the following observations: The rights of our own citizens to indemnity may be the subject of a subsequent examination. EFFECT OF CONCEDING BELLIGERENT RIGHTS. 333 Foreigners dwelling or being within the United States during the war may be distinguished as follows: 1. Those who have given aid to the rebellion. 2. Those who have been naturalized under the laws of the United States. 3. Neutral non-naturalized aliens who have exercised the clective franchise in either of the loyal States. 4. Neutral non-naturalized aliens who have acquired a permanent domicile in the United States, and were inhabitants thereof during the war, either, (a.) in the rebel States, or, (b.) in the loyal States. 5. Neutral non-naturalized aliens, who, when hostilities commenced, were merely travellers passing through the rebel States; or were inhabitants thereof for some limited purpose, and had a temporary residence, but not a personal domicile, therein; of whom there are, (a.) those who chose to remain during the war; and, (b.) those who, within reasonable time, withdrew their persons and their property from the de facto rebel jurisdiction. 6. Neutral aliens, whose mercantile domicile was in the rebel States, whatever may have been the place of their personal domicile. With regard to claims for depredations committed by rebels, it is sufficient to observe that the concession of belligerent rights to the so-called government of the Confederate States by a European power, releases the United States from all claims for injuries inflicted upon the subjects of that power by the hostile operations of the Confederate forces. If the acts of our rebellious citizens, injurious to foreigners, had been deemed and treated as merely insurrectionary, we might have been liable to indemnify foreigners against them; but no liability for their acts exists in cases where rebellious citizens are clothed by foreign nations with the immunity of belligerents, and are admitted to the quasi national rank of combatants in civil war. If aliens have any claim for losses or injuries occasioned by the hostilities of the Confederate government, to that government alone they must look for compensation. The law of war requires no nation to indemnify neutrals for injuries inflicted on them by its enemy. The practice of modern nations has established certain general rules of public law which declare the rights of neutrals and of belligerents in civil as well as in international wars; and of these the following deserve especial attention in dealing with the rights and liabil ities of foreigners. "Aliens resident here owe allegiance to the United States; so if they are abroad and leave their families here." + Flagrante bello no subject of a belligerent can transfer allegiance, or acquire foreign domicile, by emigration from his own country, so as to protect his trade against the belligerent laws of that country, or against those of a hostile power. Every nation, whenever its laws are violated by any one owing obedience to them, whether he be a citizen or a stranger, has a right, with certain exceptions, to * See Letter of Mr. Canning to Mr. Del Rios, March 25, 1825. Papers relating to Foreign Affairs, p. 89. Mr. Adams, June 14, 1861. Mr. Black to Lord Lyons, Jan. 10, 1861. Cong. Doc. 36 Cong. 2d Sess. Wheaton's Int. Law, p. 44, note of Mr. Lawrence. † 3 Greenleaf on Evidence, p. 239, note. Halleck, Int. Law, 717, sect. 29, and cases there cited. |