izens charged with treason, were amenable to our laws. But there appears to have been no valid pretext for seizing the vessel. It is simply absurd to say that these men were living despatches. (3.) The character of the vessel as a packet ship, conveying mails and passengers from one neutral port to another, almost precluded the possibility of guilt. Even if hostile military persons had been found on board, it might be a question whether their presence would involve the ship in guilt, as they were going from a neutral country and to a neutral country. (4.) It ill became the United States,-a nation which had ever insisted strenuously upon neutral rights,-to take a step more like the former British practice of extracting seamen out of neutral vessels upon the high seas, than like any modern precedent in the conduct of civilized nations, and that too when she had protested against this procedure on the part of Great Britain and made it a ground of war. As for the rest, this affair of the Trent has been of use to the world, by committing Great Britain to the side of neutral rights upon the seas.*

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peace, but opened

Certain kinds of trade, as the coasting and colonial, have been by the policy of most nations confined to Trade closed in national vessels in time of peace; and neutrals in war. have been allowed to participate in them only when war rendered the usual mode of conveyance unsafe. It would appear, that to make such trade lawful, licenses were granted to particular vessels, and the belligerent captor could, with justice,

* For the subjects embraced within this section see Marquardsen (prof. at Erlangen) der Trent-Fall, Erlangen, 1862.-For the conveyance of troops and of despatches most of the modern text-writers may be consulted, as Wheaton, IV. 3, § 25; Heffter, § 157 b; Ortolan, II. 213; Wildman, II. 234-244; Phillimore, III. § 273. The cases, which have principally determined the law in the matter of despatches, are those of the Atalanta, 6 Robinson's Rep. 440, Carolina, ibid. 465, and Madison, Edwards' Rep. 224. The Atalanta brought despatches from the French governor of the Isle of France to the French minister of marine, and was condemned; the Caro lina, from the French ambassador in the United States, a neutral country, to his home government, and was released.-For the course which the United States should have taken from the first news of the Trent affair, in consistency with our past principles, comp. Mr. Sumner's speech in the Senate of the United States in Jan. 1862.

take the ground that the vessel under license had identified itself with the enemy. In the seven years' war, declared in 1756, the British government and courts maintained that this kind of trade was prohibited by the law of nations: hence the principle, that a neutral could not lawfully engage, during war, in a trade with the enemy, from which he had been shut out in peace, is called the rule of 1756. The rule was protested against in 1780 by the first armed neutrality, so far as coasting trade was concerned; but in 1793 and onwards was enforced by the British government; although, now, the trade was no longer carried on by special license, but was opened to all neutral vessels. The grounds on which the rule stood were, that the neutral interfered to save one of the belligerents from the state of distress to which the arms of his foe had reduced him, and thus identified himself with him. The neutral states have never allowed that the rule forms a part of the international code. Its practical importance," Dr. Wheaton observes, "will probably hereafter be much diminished by the revolution which has taken place in the colonial system of Europe.*

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The word blockade properly denotes obstructing the passage into or from a place on either element, but is Blockade. more especially applied to naval forces preventing communication by water. With blockades by land or ordinary sieges neutrals have usually little to do.

What places can

A blockade is not confined to a seaport, but may have effect on a roadstead or portion of a coast, or the be blockaded. mouth of a river. But if the river is a pathway to interior neutral territories, the passage on the stream of vessels destined for neutral soil cannot be impeded. It has been asserted, that no place could be put under blockade, unless it were fortified; but the law of nations knows no such limitation.t

There is a general agreement that it is unlawful for a neu* Wheaton, El. IV. 3, § 27, at the end.

+ By Lucchesi-Palli, p. 180, of the French translation of the Italian work, cited by Ortolan, II 299.

of blockade un

tral vessel knowingly to attempt to break a block- Why is a breach ade, whether by issuing from or entering the lawful? blockaded place. Such an act, especially of ingress, tends to aid one of the belligerents in the most direct manner against the designs of the other, and is therefore a great departure from the line of neutrality. And a similar act on land would involve the loss of the most innocent articles intended for a besieged town. M. Ortolan places the obligation to respect a blockade on the ground that there is an actual substitution of sovereignty, that is, that one belligerent has possession by occupancy of the waters of the other. But this is a formal way of defending the right of blockade, and may be found fault. with, perhaps, for the reason that sovereignty over water along a coast is merely an incident to sovereignty on the adjoining land, which the blockader has not yet acquired. The true ground of the right is simply this, that the belligerent has a right to carry on a siege; and that his act of commencing such a siege places neutrals under an obligation not to interfere with his plans. If the sea were a common pathway to the very coast this right would still subsist.

Blockades may be considered in regard to their objective validity, to the evidence which the neutral ought to have of the fact, or their subjective validity, to the conduct which constitutes a breach of blockade and its penalties, and to the history of attempts to stretch the notion of blockade beyond the limits prescribed by international law.

A valid or lawful blockade requires the actual presence of a sufficient force of the enemy's vessels before a 1. What is a valid certain place on the coast. By presence is intend- blockade? ed general presence, or presence so far as the elements do not interfere, so that the dispersion for a time of the blockading squadron by a storm is not held to amount to its being broken up. For this there must be abandonment of the undertaking. What a sufficient force is, cannot be determined with logical rigor. It may be said to be such a force as will involve a vessel attempting to pass the line of blockade in considerable danger of being taken.

Treaties have sometimes determined the amount of force necessary to make a blockade valid. Thus a treaty of 1742, between France and Denmark, declares that the entry of a port, to be blockaded, must be closed by at least two vessels, or by a battery of cannons placed on the coast, in such sort that vessels cannot get in without manifest danger. A treaty of 1753, between Holland and the two Sicilies, requires the presence of at least six vessels of war, at the distance of a little more than cannon-shot from the place, or the existence of batteries raised on the coast, such that entrance cannot be effected without passing under the besieger's guns. A treaty of 1818, between Russia and Denmark, repeats in substance the provisions of the first named treaty.

blockades unlaw

ful.

It results from this, that all paper or cabinet-blockades, Paper or cabinet- whether declarations of an intention to blockade a place without sending an adequate force thither, or the mere formality of pronouncing a tract of coast under blockade, are an undue stretch of belligerent right, and of no validity whatever. Such grievous offences against the rights of neutrals have come, it is to be hoped, to a perpetual end, since the nations which offended most signally in this respect were parties to the declaration accompanying the peace of Paris (April 16, 1856), that "blockades in order to be binding must be effectual, that is to say, maintained by a force, sufficient in reality to prevent access to the coast of the enemy.' (§ 175.)

the existence of a

blockade.

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As a blockade arises from some positive act and not from a 2. Evidence of mere intention, as it is a temporary, and, it may be, an often-repeated measure, and as a neutral, is, in general, innocent in endeavoring to enter any port in his friend's territory, it is manifest that in order to become guilty, he must have had the means of obtaining due notice of the new state of things which a blockade has occasioned.

The best notice is, when a vessel approaching a port, or attempting to enter it, is warned off by a ship pertaining to the blockading squadron. In many

What is due notice?

special treaties this is required. In that of 1794, between Great Britain and the United States, it is provided, that whereas vessels frequently "sail for a port or place belonging to an enemy without knowing that the same is either besieged, blockaded, or invested, it is agreed that every vessel so circumstanced may be turned away from such port or place; but she shall not be detained, nor her cargo, if not contraband, be confiscated, unless, after notice, she shall again attempt to enter." Similar stipulations exist in treaties between France and the governments of Spanish America.*

Justice to neutrals requires that their ships should not be subject to the risk and delays of a voyage to a port, where they may be debarred admission. The universal practice, is, therefore, to communicate the news of a blockade to neutral governments, upon whom lies the responsibility of making it known to those who are engaged in commerce. And if such notice be given, similar notice must be given of the discontinuance of a blockade, as far as possible. For a wrong is done to neutrals, if they are left to find out as they can that a blockade is terminated, since a long time may elapse before it will be considered safe to return to the old channel of commerce.

There is a difference of practice in regard to the amount of notification which neutrals may claim. The French hold, if we mistake not, that both a notice from the government of the belligerent, and notice from a blockading vessel, at or near the port, are necessary, so that a vessel will not incur guilt by coming to a port in order to ascertain whether a blockade, made known in the diplomatic way, is still kept up. The English authorities make two kinds of blockade, one a blockade de facto, which begins and ends with the fact, and which will involve no vessel attempting to enter a harbor in guilt, unless previously warned off; and the other a blockade, by notification, accompanied by the fact. In the latter case, the presumption is that the blockade continues until notice to

* Wheaton, El. IV. 3, § 28, p. 544; Ortolan, II. 305, seq.-Treaties of France, with Brazil (1828), Bolivia (1834), Texas (1839), Venezuela (1843), Equador (1843), and others more recent, contain such provisions.