Article 44 of the alien law in force in Cuba, under which the consul of the country to which an intestate alien belonged had the right to administer upon his estate, continued in force after Spain's relinquishment of sovereignty over the island. Griggs, At.-Gen., April 26, 1900, 23 Op. 93; For. Rel. 1901, 226. A claim having been made by an English firm by reason of the refusal of the municipal authorities of Manila to carry out an alleged contract for supplying certain fire apparatus to the city, it was stated that implied provision had been made by the military government of the Philippines for the protection of the rights of the claimants under the alleged contract "by the continuance of the established laws under which the contract was made, if at all, and by the establishment of competent courts whose decree will be enforced by the executive department." Mr. Root, Sec. of War, to Mr. Hay, Sec. of State, Dec. 6, 1900, Magoon's 5. ON PUBLIC OBLIGATIONS. $96. "No principle of international law can be more clearly established than this: That the rights and the obligations of a nation in regard to other States are independent of its internal revolutions of government. It extends even to the case of conquest. The conqueror who reduces a nation to his subjection receives it subject to all its engagements and duties toward others, the fulfillment of which then becomes his own duty. However frequent the instances of departure from this principle may be in point of fact, it can not with any color of reason be contested on the ground of right." Mr. Adams, Sec. of State, to Mr. Everett, chargé d'affaires to The Netherlands, In the event of a state being divided into two or more independent sovereignties, the obligations which had accrued to the whole before the division are ratably binding on the different parts; for, as Story says, the division of an empire creates no forfeiture of previously vested rights of property." And so, e contrario, where several separate states are incorporated into one sovereignty, the rights and obligations that belonged to each before the union are binding upon the new state; but, as General Halleck points out, of course the rule must be modified to suit the nature of the union formed and the character of the act of incorporation in each particular case.” Abdy's Kent (1878), 96, citing Lawrence's Wheaton (1863), 52, note 20. “The opinion of the United States heretofore has been that as the foreign obligations of Peru, incurred in good faith before the war, rested upon and were secured by the products of her guano deposits, Chile was under a moral obligation not to appropriate that security without recognizing the lien existing thereon. This opinion was frankly made known to Chile, and our belief was expressed that no arrangement would be made between the two countries by which the ability of Peru to meet her honest engagements toward foreigners would be impaired by the direct act of Chile. This Government went so far as to announce that it could not be a party as mediator or directly lend its sanction to any arrangement which should impair the power of Peru to pay those debts. "This attitude was taken, not because any appreciable portion of the bonded debt is known to be held by citizens of the United States, nor because of any purpose to officiously guarantee the eventual rights of alien bondholders, but from an intimate conviction that any settlement would be fraught with embarrassment or even peril to both Chile and Peru, which by its terms did not provide for the payment. of the honest debt of Peru. "The same considerations which led this Government to refrain from taking an active initiative in compelling a peace, would lead it to refrain likewise from active opposition to an engagement already signed. "Without knowing the text of the treaty provisions concerning the foreign debt of Peru, it is not easy to particularize an instruction to you. You will, however, abstain from any protest to the Chilean Minister at Lima against the pending ratification of the treaty by Chile. You will likewise abstain from any formulated protest to the provisional government of General Iglesias against such ratification by the coming Assembly. That Assembly is convened for the purpose, as is believed, of permitting a free expression of the will of the Peruvian nation, and it would be contrary to the declared policy of this Government to seek to influence its action in the direction of any determinate solution. "At the same time, it would be the part of frankness not to withhold from such influential Peruvians as may converse with you on the state of their country the firm conviction that in order to render the treaty satisfactory and peace permanent, provision should be made for the payment of the honest indebtedness of Peru. If, as it is supposed, the treaty lately signed commits Chile to a partial recognition of the existing lien by a payment on account, it remains for Peru to make some equally distinct and efficacious provision for meeting the remainder." Mr. Frelinghuysen, Sec. of State, to Mr. Phelps, min. to Peru, Dec. 29, 1883, See, also, Mr. Frelinghuysen, Sec. of State, to Mr. Roustan, French min., so far as they impaired guarantees given by Peru to her foreign creditors. "The treaty," said Mr. Frelinghuysen, was eventually concluded in terms at variance with those which the United States had amicably counselled, and is now ratified by both Chile and Peru. I am not now called upon to express an opinion as to whether, in the relations of governments, a security for a debt is to be followed in rem through all its vicissitudes of ownership." (MS. Notes to French Leg. IX. 597.) In For. Rel. 1888, I. 182-186, there is a correspondence between the British minister in Chile and the Chilean minister of foreign relations touching the claims of Peruvian creditors on the revenues of the province of Tarapaca, and certain provisions of the Grace-Anibar contract for the settlement of the Peruvian debt. The Chilean Government contended that the Peruvian Government in attempting by the loan of 1872 to mortgage the guano beds of Tarapaca exceeded its legal powers, the acts under which the loan was issued not granting the necessary authority for the purpose; and that the only obligations of Chile in the premises, as successor in sovereignty of Peru in Tarapaca, were those which she voluntarily assumed by the decree of February 9, 1882, giving to the creditors of Peru 50 per cent of the net proceeds of the sale of 1,000,000 tons of guano, and by the treaty of peace of Oct. 20, 1883, which confirmed (Art. IV.) the decree of 1882, and stipulated, besides, that, after the sale of the 1,000,000 tons, Chile would continue to pay to the Peruvian creditors 50 per cent of the net proceeds of guano till the debt should be extinguished or the deposits be exhausted. (For. Rel. 1883, 731.) Moreover, the Chilean Government, in the course of the correspondence, declared that it was "the right of the victor to become unconditional owner of a part of the enemy's territory" for war purposes and future security; that the object of the Peruvian loans was the building of railroads and other national works exclusively in territory which Peru preserved; and that Chile had not intended, in conceding something to the creditors of Peru, who held the latter's "mere promise of honor," to acknowledge any "pretended hypothecate rights." Chili, in taking possession, at the close of the war with Peru, of the guano deposits belonging to Peru, took them subject only to such liens as were binding under Peruvian law at the time of cession. Mr. Bayard, Sec. of State, to Mr. Cowie, June 15, 1885, 156 MS. Dom. Let. 1. "The general doctrine of international law, founded upon obvious principles of justice, is, that in case of annexation of a state or cession of territory, the substituted sovereignty assumes the debts and obligations of the absorbed state or territory-it takes the burdens with the benefits. Mr. Adams, when Secretary of State, expressed the principle thus, extending it even to the case of acquisition by conquest: “The conqueror who reduces a nation to his subjection receives it subject to all its engagements and duties toward others, the fulfillment of which then becomes his own duty.' (1 Whart. Int. Law Dig., sec. 5.) 666 "The subject is discussed by Mr. Hall (International Law, 4th ed., pp. 104, 105), and in Rivier (Principes du Droit des Gens, I., pp. 70-72, note, and authorities and instances cited). "No fair exception to this rule can be perceived, unless expressly provided for by treaty stipulations or the instrument of cession, when the absorbed territory becomes an integral part of the acquiring state, and is altogether merged in it. . . If there is a "Where the federal idea obtains, this is not so. distinct and independent civilized government, potent and capable within its territorial limits, conducted by a separate executive, not acting as the mere representative by appointment of the distant central administration, I perceive no reason to doubt that such government rather than the central authority should respond, out of its separate assets, to any valid claims upon it, whether accruing in the past, presently accruing, or to accrue in the future. "There is nothing in the Hawaiian resolution of annexation which gives the negative to this theory. . . . In no respect, save a temporary delay in the process of adjustment, am I able to see that the situation as to Hawaii differs from that just stated, and I am hence of the opinion that the function of the State Department with relation to such foreign claims is to receive them through diplomatic channels, and transmit them to the government of Hawaii for adjustment." Griggs, At.-Gen., Sept. 20, 1899, 22 Op. 583. This opinion was given in reply to a letter of the Secretary of State, of Sept. 3, 1899, relating to certain claims against Hawaii, arising prior to annexation, which were afterwards presented to the Department of State as claims against the United States. The letter of the Secretary of State suggested the questions whether the claims were extinguished by the annexation, or whether they had thereby assumed the character of claims against the United States. Both these questions the Attorney-General, as has been seen, answered in the negative. The particular claims referred to were those mentioned in S. Doc. 116, 55 Cong. 3 sess. 111 et seq. See, also, Memorandum, 239 MS. Dom. Let. 109. The Attorney-General declined to advise that they be referred to the Court of Claims. As to the jurisdiction of the Court of Claims, see United States v. New York, 160 U. S. 598, 615. Hall finds in the "personality of the state" the "key" to the answer to be given to the question of the relation of a new state to the “contract obligations," property, and privileges of the parent state. With rights acquired and obligations contracted by the old state in a personal" capacity, the new state has nothing to do. On the other hand, says Hall, "rights possessed in respect of the lost territory, including rights under treaties relating to cessions of territory and demarcations of boundary, obligations contracted with reference to it alone, and property which is within it, and which has therefore a local character, or which, though not within it, belongs to state institutions localized there, transfer themselves to the new state person." Likewise, the new state "is not liable for the general debt of the parent state," but H. Doc. 551- 22 "it is saddled with local obligations, such as that to regulate the channel of a river, or to levy no more than certain dues along its course; and local debts, whether they be debts contracted for local objects, or debts secured upon local revenues, are binding upon it. . . . "When part of a state is separated from it by way of cession, the state itself. is in the same position with respect to rights, obligations, and property as in the case of acquisition of independence by the separate portion. To a certain extent also the situation of the separated part is identical with that which it would possess in the case of independence. It carries over to the state which it enters the local obligations by which it would under such circumstances have been bound, and the local rights and property which it would have enjoyed. In other respects it is differently placed. In becoming incorporated with the state to which it is ceded it acquires a share in all the rights which the former has as a state person, and it is bound by the parallel obligations. . . . "When a state ceases to exist by absorption in another state, the latter in the same way is the inheritor of all local rights, obligations, and property." Hall, Int. Law, 4th ed., 96, 97, 98, 104, 105. In a note, at page 98, Hall says: "The subject is one upon which writers on international law are generally unsatisfactory. They are incomplete, and they tend to copy one another. Grotius, for example, says that if a state is split up anything which may have been held in common by the parts separating from each other must either be administered in common or be ratably divided;' De Jure Belli ac Pacis, lib. II. c. ix. §10. Kent (Comm. I. 25) does little more than paraphrase this in laying down that 'if a state should be divided in respect to territory, its rights and obligations are not impaired; and if they have not been apportioned by special agreement, those rights are to be enjoyed, and those obligations fulfilled, by all the parts in common.' Phillimore quotes Grotius and Kent, and adds, if a nation be divided into various distinct societies, the obligations which had accrued to the whole, before the division, are, unless they have been the subject of a special agreement, ratably binding upon the different parts.' I. § cxxxvii. It is difficult to be sure whether these writers only contemplate the rare case of a state so splitting up that the original state person is represented by no one of the fractions into which it is divided, or whether they refer also to the more common case of the loss of such portion of the state territory and population by secession that the continuity of the life of the state is not broken. If the former is their meaning, their doctrine is correct so far as property and monetary obligations are concerned; if not, it would be hard to justify their language even to this extent. No doubt the debt of a state from which another separates itself ought generally to be divided between the two proportionately to their respective resources as a matter of justice to the creditors, because it is seldom that the value of their security is not affected by a diminution of the state indebted to them; but the obligation is a moral, not a legal one. . . . The true rule is recognized by Halleck (I. 76), who distinguishes the case of a state which is so split up as to |