Is, then, property which consists in the promise of a State, or of a municipality of a State, beyond the reach of taxation? We do not affirm that it is. A State may undoubtedly tax any of its creditors within its jurisdiction for the debt due to him, and regulate the amount of the tax by the rate of interest the debt bears, if its promise be left unchanged. A tax thus laid impairs no obligation assumed. It leaves the contract untouched. But until payment of the debt or interest has been made, as stipulated, we think no act of State sovereignty can work an exoneration from what has been promised to the creditor, namely, payment to him, without a violation of the Constitution. "The true rule of every case of property founded on contract with the government is this: It must first be reduced into possession, and then it will become subject in common with other similar property to the right of the government to raise contributions upon it. It may be said that the government may fulfill this principle by paying the interest with one hand and taking back the amount of the tax with the other. But to this the answer is, that to comply truly with the rule the tax must be upon all the money of the community, not upon the particular portion of it which is paid to the public creditors, and it ought to be so regulated as not to include a lien upon the fund. The creditor should be no otherwise acted upon thar. as any other possessor of moneys, and consequently the money he receives from the public can thus only be a fit subject of taxation when it is entirely separated" (from the contract) " and thrown undistinguished into the common mass."-3 Hamilton Works, 514 et seq. Thus only can contracts with the State be allowed to have the same meaning as all other similar contracts have.

Such limitations of the power of State taxation we have heretofore recognized. We have held property in one stage of its ownership not to be taxable and in a succeeding stage to be taxable. Those decisions are not without some analogy to the rule we have mentioned. Thus, in Brown v. Maryland, 12 Wheaton, 419-441, where it was held that a State tax could not bo levied, by the requisition of a license, upon importers of merchandise by the bale or package, or upon other persons selling the goods imported by the bale or package, Marshall, C. J., considering both the prohibition upon States against taxing imports and their general power to tax persons and property, said: "Where the importer has so acted upon the thing imported that it has become incorporated and mixed up with the mass of property in the country, it has, perhaps, lost its distinctive character as an import and has become subject to the taxing power of the State."-Vide, also, Woodruff v. Parham, 8 Wall. 122; State Tax on Railway Gross Receipts, 15 id. 295. A tax on income derived from contracts, if it does not prevent the receipt of the income, cannot be said to vary or lessen the debtor's obligation imposed by the contracts.

In opposition to the conclusion we have reached we are referred to the Champaign County Bank v. Smith, 7 Ohio State, 42, and People v. Home Ins. Co., 29 Cal. 533, in which it is said the power of a State to tax its own bonds was sustained. We do not, however, regard those cases as in conflict with the opinion we now hold; and if they were they would not control our judgment when we are called upon to determine the meaning and extent of the Federal Constitution. In the former it appeared that the tax collected was in virtue

of an assessment of State bonds belonging to the bank, but deposited with the auditor of State as security for the circulating notes of the company. The tax thus assessed having been carried into the duplicate, the collector seized and appropriated the bank notes and money of the bank, and suit was brought to recover the amount so taken. In sustaining a demurrer to the petition the court held, it is true, that a State has power to tax its own bonds equally with other property, and that the exercise of such a power involves no violation of a contract. But it was not held that the State could collect the tax by withholding from the creditor any part of what the State had assumed to pay. The tax was laid, not upon the debt, but upon the creditor, and it was collected, not out of what the State owed, but out of the general property of the bank. Neither by the assessment nor in the collection was there any interference with the contract. In The People v. The Home Insurance Company the question was whether bonds of the State of California, belonging to a New York insurance company, but deposited and kept in the State, as required by an act to tax and regulate foreign insurance companies doing business in the State, were assessable for taxation there. It was ruled that they were. This case, no more than the former, meets the question we have before us. It certainly does not hold that a State or a city by virtue of its taxing power can convert its undertaking to pay a debt bearing six per cent interest into one bearing only four.

These are the only cases cited to us as directly sustaining the judgment we have now in view. How far short of sustaining it they are must be apparent. And we know of none that are more in point. It seems incredible that there can be any, for as we said in State Tax v. Pennsylvania, 15 Wall. 320,"the law which requires the treasurer of the company (indebted) to retain five per cent of the interest due to the non-resident bondholder is not * * * a legitimate exercise of the taxing power. It is a law which interferes between the company and the bondholder, and under the pretense of levying a tax commands the company to withhold a portion of the stipulated interest and pay it over to the State. It is a law which thus impairs the obligation of the contract between the parties. The obligation of a contract depends upon its terms and the means which the law in existence at the time affords for its enforcement. A law which alters the terms of a contract by imposing new conditions, or dispensing with those expressed, is a law which impairs its obligation, for such a law * * relieves the parties from the moral duty of performing the original stipulations of the contract, and it prevents their legal euforcement." What was thus said, it is true, was in a case where the question was whether a tax thus imposed upon a non-resident holder of bonds issued by a company chartered by the State was warranted by the Constitution. But so far as it speaks of what constitutes impairing contract obligation it is applicable in its fullest extent to all legislation affecting con tracts, no matter who may be the parties.

*

We do not care now to enter upon the consideration of the question whether a State can tax a debt due by one of its citizens or municipalities to a non-resident creditor, nor whether it has any jurisdiction over such a creditor or over the credit he owns. Such a discussion is not necessary, and it may be doubtful whether the question is presented to us by this record.

It is enough for the present case that we hold, as we

do, that no municipality of a State can by its own ordinances, under the guise of taxation, relieve itself from performing to the letter all that it has expressly promised to its creditors.

There is no more important provision in the Federal Constitution than the one which prohibits States from passing laws impairing the obligation of contracts, and it is one of the highest duties of this court to take care the prohibition shall neither be evaded nor frittered away. Complete effect must be given to it in all its spirit. The inviolability of contracts and the duty of performing them, as made, are foundations of all well ordered society, and to prevent the removal or disturbance of these foundations was one of the great objects for which the Constitution was framed.

The judgment of the Supreme Court of South Carolina is reversed, and the record is remitted with instructions to proceed in accordance with this opinion. Miller and Hunt, JJ., dissenting.

We are of opinion that the power of taxation found in the charter of the city of Charleston long before the contract was made which is here sued on, entered, like all other laws, into the contract and became a part of it. In other words, the contract was made subject to this power of taxation by the city of Charleston as found in her charter from 1781 to the present time.

The imposition and collection of this tax cannot, therefore, impair the obligation of a contract which was made subject to her right to exercise that power. We therefore dissent.

TRIAL OF EXTRADITED CRIMINALS FOR OFFENSES NOT NAMED IN TREATY.

KENTUCKY COURT OF APPEALS, APRIL 17, 1878.

COMMONWEALTH V. HAWES.

The right of one government to demand and receive from another the custody of an offender who has sought asylum upon its soil, depends upon the existence of treaty stipulations between them, and in all cases is derived from and is measured and restricted by the provisions, express and implied, of the treaty.

A fugitive from justice was, under the provisions of the extradition treaty of 1842, between this country and Great Britain, surrendered by the Canadian authorities to be tried in Kentucky upon an indictment for forgery. Held, that he could not, while in the custody of the court, under such surrender, be tried upon an indictment for embezzlement.

Α'

PPEAL by the Commonwealth from an order of the Kenton Criminal Court directing that the defendant, Smith N. Hawes, indicted for embezzlement, be not held in custody, and that the case against him be not placed on the docket. The facts appear in the opinion.

T. E. Moss and W. W. Cleary, for appellant. J. G. Carlisle and J. W. Stevenson, for appellee. LINDSAY, C. J. Smith N. Hawes stood indicted in the Kenton Criminal Court for uttering forged paper, for embezzlement, and also upon four separate and distinct charges of forgery. He was found to be a resident of the town of London, in the Dominion of Canada, and in February, 1877, was demanded by the President of the United States, and surrendered by the Canadian authorities to answer three of said charges of forgery.

As to the fourth charge, the evidence of his criminality was not deemed sufficient, and that alleged offense was omitted from the warrant of extradition.

The demand and surrender were made in virtue of,

and pursuant to, the tenth article of the treaty concluded August 9th, 1842, between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the United States of America.

The attorney for the Commonwealth caused two of the indictments for forgery to be dismissed. Hawes was regularly tried under each of the remaining two, and in each case a judgment of acquittal was rendered in his favor, upon a verdict of not guilty.

After all this, however, the officers of Kenton county continued to hold him in custody, and finally, on motion of the attorney for the Commonwealth, one of the indictments for embezzlement was set down to be tried on the 6th day of July, 1877. Further action was postponed from time to time until the 21st of August, 1877, when Hawes presented his affidavit, setting out all the facts attending his surrender, and the purposes for which it was made, and moved the court to continue all the indictments then pending against him, and to surrender him to the authorities of the United States, to be by them returned or permitted to return to his domicile and asylum in the Dominion of Canada. This motion was subsequently modified to the extent that the court was asked to set aside the returns of the sheriff on the various bench warrants under which he had been arrested, and to release him from custody.

The court, in effect, sustained this modified motion, and ordered "that the cases of the Commonwealth of Kentucky v. Smith N. Hawes, for embezzlement, and for uttering forged instruments with intent, etc., be continued, and be not again placed on the docket for trial, and that said Hawes be not held in custody until the further order of this court."

From said order the Commonwealth has prosecuted this appeal. It is not final in its nature, but under the provisions of sections 335 and 337 of the Criminal Code of Practice, it may nevertheless be reviewed by this court.

It was the opinion of the learned judge (Jackson) who presided in the court below, that the tenth article of the treaty of 1842 impliedly prohibited the government of the United States and the Commonwealth of Kentucky from proceeding to try Hawes for any other offense than one of those for which he had been extradited, without first affording him an opportunity to return to Canada, and that he could not be lawfully held in custody to answer a charge for which he could not be put upon trial.

The correctness of this opinion depends on the true construction of the tenth article of the treaty, and also on the solution of the question as to how far the judicial tribunals of the Federal and State governments are required to take cognizance of, and in proper cases to give effect to, treaty stipulations between our own and foreign governments.

Section 2, article of the Federal Constitution, declares that: "This Constitution, and the laws of the United States, made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land, and the judges of every State shall be bound thereby, any thing in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding."

It will thus be seen that with us a public treaty is not merely a compact or bargain to be carried out by the executive and legislative departments of the general government, but a living law, operating upon and binding the judicial tribunals, State and Federal, and these tribunals are under the same obligation to notice and give it effect, as they are to notice and enforce the

Constitution, and the laws of Congress made in pursuance thereof.

"A treaty is in its nature a compact between two nations, not a legislative act. It does not generally effect of itself the object to be accomplished, especially so far as its object is infra-territorial, but is carried into execution by the sovereign powers of the respective parties to the instrument. In the United States a different principle is established. Our Constitution declares a treaty to be the law of the land. It is consequently to be regarded in the courts of justice as equivalent to an act of the Legislature whenever it operates of itself, without the aid of any legislative provision." Foster v. Neilson, 2 Peters, 253, per Chief Justice Marshall.

When it is provided, by treaty, that certain acts shall not be done, or that certain limitations or restrictions shall not be disregarded or exceeded by the contracting parties, the compact does not need to be supplemented by legislative or executive action, to authorize the courts of justice to decline to override these limitations, or to exceed the prescribed restrictions, for the palpable and all-sufficient reason, that to do so would be not only to violate the public faith, but to transgress the "supreme law of the land."

A different rule seems to have been intimated in the case of Caldwell (8 Blackford, C. C. Reports, 131), but the real decision rendered in that, as in the subsequent case of Lawrence (13 Blackford, C. C. Reports, 295), decided by the same judge, was, that extradition proceedings had pursuant to the treaty under consideration, do not by their nature secure to the person surrendered, immunity from prosecution for offenses other than the one upon which the surrender is made, and the intimation in Caldwell's case, that the judiciary may leave it to the executive department to interfere to preserve and protect the good faith of the government in a case like this, is at the most but a dictum. The tenth article of the treaty of 1842 is as follows:

"It is agreed that the United States and Her Britannic Majesty,shall, upon mutual requisitions by them, or their ministers, officers, or authorities, respectively made, deliver up to justice all persons, who, being charged with the crime of murder or assault with intent to commit murder, or piracy, or arson, or robbery, or forgery, or the utterance of forged paper, committed within the jurisdiction of either, shall seek an asylum, or shall be found within the territories of the other : Provided, that this shall only be done upon such evidence of criminality as, according to the laws of the place where the fugitive or person so charged shall be found, would justify his apprehension and commitment for trial, If the orime or offense had there been committed; and the respective judges and other magistrates of the two governments shall have power, jurisdiction, and authority, upon complaint made under oath, to issue a warrant for the apprehension of the fugitive or person so charged, that he may be brought before such judges or other magistrates, respectively, to the end that the evidence of criminality may be heard and considered; and if, on such hearing, the evidence be deemed sufficient to sustain the charge, it shall be the duty of the examining judge or magistrate to certify the same to the proper executive authority, that a warrant may issue for the surrender of such fugitive."

It will be seen that the trial and punishment of the surrendered fugitive for crimes other than those

mentioned in the treaty is not prohibited in terms, and that fact is regarded as of controlling importance by those who hold to the view that Hawes was not entitled to the immunity awarded him by the court below. But if the prohibition can be fairly implied from the language and general scope of the treaty, considered in connection with the purposes the contracting parties had in view, and the nature of the subject about which they were treating, it is entitled to like respect, and will be as sacredly observed as though it was expressed in clear and unambiguous terms.

Public treaties are to be fairly interpreted, and the intention of the contracting parties to be ascertained by the application of the same rules of construction, and the same course of reasoning which we apply to the interpretation of private contracts.

By the enumeration of seven well-defined crimes for which extradition may be had, the parties plainly excluded the idea that demand might be made as matter of right for the surrender of a fugitive charged with an offense not named in the enumeration, no matter how revolting or wicked it may be.

By providing the terms and conditions upon which a warrant for the arrest of the alleged fugitive may be issued, and confining the duty of making the surrender to cases in which the evidence of criminality is sufficient, according to the laws of the place where such fugitive is found, to justify his commitment for trial, the right of the demanding government to decide finally as to the propriety of the demand, and as to the evidences of guilt, is as plainly excluded as if that right had been denied by express language.

It would scarcely be regarded an abuse of the rules of construction, from these manifest restrictions, unaided by extraneous considerations, to deduce the conclusion that it was not contemplated by the contracting parties that an extradited prisoner should, under any circumstances, be compelled to defend himself against a charge other than the one upon which he is surrendered, much less against one for which his extradition could not be demanded.

The consequences to which the opposite view may lead, though by no means conclusive against it, are nevertheless to receive due and proper weight.

It would present a remarkable state of case to have one government saying in substance to the other: "You cannot demand the surrender of a person charged with embezzlement. My judges or other magistrates have no right or authority, upon such a demand, either to apprehend the person so accused, or to inquire into the evidences of his criminality; and if they should assume to do so, and should find the evidence sufficient to sustain the charge, the proper executive authority could not lawfully issue the warrant for his surrender. But you may obviate this defect in the treaty by resting your demand upon the charge of forgery, and if you can make out a prima facie case against the fugitive, you may take him into custody, and then, without a breach of faith, and without violating either the letter or spirit of our treaty, compel him to go to trial upon the indictment for the non-extraditable offense of embezzlement."

And if this indirect mode of securing the surrender of persons guilty of other than extraditable offenses may be resorted to, or if the demand, when made in the utmost good faith, to secure the custody of a criminal within the provisions of the treaty, can be

made available to bring him to justice for an offense for which he would not have been surrendered, then we do not very well see how either government could complain if a lawfully extradited fugitive should be tried and convicted of a political offense. Prosecutions for the crime of treason are no more provided against by the treaty than prosecutions for the crime of embezzlement, or the offense of bribing a public officer.

Mr. Fish, in his letter of May 22, 1876, to Mr. Hoffman, in reference to the extradition of Winslow, attempts to meet this difficulty by saying that neither the extradition clause in the treaty of 1794, nor in that of 1842, contains any reference to immunity for political offenses, or to the protection of asylum for religious refugees. The public sentiment of both countries made it unnecessary. Between the United States and Great Britain it was not supposed on either side that guarantees were required of each other against a thing inherently impossible, any more than by the laws of Solon was a punishment deemed necessary against the crime of parricide, which was beyond the possibility of contemplation."

But President Tyler, under whose administration the treaty of 1842 was concluded, evidently thought that the guarantees of immunity to political refugees were to be implied from the treaty itself, and not left to rest alone on the public sentiment of the two countries. In communicating the draft of the treaty to the Senate for its ratification, speaking of the subject of extradition, he said:

"The article on the subject, in the proposed treaty, is carefully confined to such offenses as all mankind agree to regard as heinous and destructive of the security of life and property. In this careful and specific enumeration of crimes, the object has been to exclude all political offenses, or criminal charges arising from wars or intestine commotions. Treason, misprision of treason, libels, desertion from military service, and other offenses of similar character, are excluded."

This interpretation was cotemporaneous with the treaty itself, and deserves the higher consideration, from the fact that it was contained in a paper prepared by the then Secretary of State, Mr. Webster, who represented the government of the United States in the negotiations from which it resulted.

It seems, also, that the extradition article of the treaty was understood in the same way by the British Parliament in 1843. The act of Parliament of that year, passed for the purpose of carrying it into effect, directed that such persons as should thereafter be extradited to the United States should be delivered" to such person or persons as shall be authorized, in the name of the United States, to receive the person so committed, and to convey him to the United States, to be tried for the crime of which such person shall be accused."

The precise purpose for which the fugitive is to be surrendered is set out in exact and apt language, and the act negatives, by necessary implication, the right here claimed, that the person surrendered may be tried for an offense different from that for which he was extradited, and one for which his surrender could not have been demanded.

The American Executive in 1842, and the British Parliament in 1843, seem to have been impressed with the conviction that the treaty secured to persons surrendered under its provisions an immunity from trial

for political offenses far more stable and effectual than the public sentiment of the two countries. Experience had taught them that in times of intestine strife and civil commotions, the most enlightened public sentiment may become warped and perverted, just as it has taught that man is sometimes capable of committing the unnatural crime of parricide, although such a crime seemed impossible to the great Athenian law-giver.

And this view was adhered to by Congress in 1848, when the general law providing for the surrender of persons charged with crime to the various governments with which we had treaty stipulations on that subject, was passed. After setting out the necessary preliminary steps, it was provided by the 3d section of that act, "That it shall be lawful for the Secretary of State, under his hand and seal of office, to order the person so committed to be delivered to such person or persons as shall be authorized, in the name and on behalf of such foreign government, to be tried for the crime of which such person shall be accused."

This, like the act of Parliament, declares the purpose of the surrender to be that the alleged offender may "be tried for the crime of which such person shall be accused."

The maxim, expressio unius est exclusio alterius, may with propriety be applied to each of these acts, and read in the light of that maxim, they are persuasive at least of the construction which, up to 1848, the two contracting parties had placed on the tenth article of the treaty.

The act of Congress is, in one view, more important than the British act of 1843. It does not rest alone on the proper interpretation of a particular treaty, and may be regarded as a legislative declaration of the American idea of the fundamental or underlying principles of the international practice of extradition.

The ancient doctrine that a sovereign State is bound by the law of nations to deliver up persons charged with, or convicted of, crimes committed in another country, upon the demand of the State whose laws they have violated, never did permanently obtain in the United States. It was supported by jurists of distinction, like Kent and Story, but the doctrine has long prevailed with us that a foreign government has no right to demand the surrender of a violator of its laws unless we are under obligations to make the surrender, in obedience to the stipulations of an existing treaty. (Lawrence's Wheaton's on International Law, page 233, and authorities cited.)

As said by Mr. Cushing, in the matter of Hamilton, a fugitive from the justice of the State of Indiana, "It is the established rule of the United States neither to grant nor to ask for extradition of criminals as between us and any foreign government, unless in cases for which stipulation is made by express convention." (Opinions of Attorney-Generals, volume 6, page 431.)

From the treatise of Mr. Clark on the subject of extradition, we feel authorized to infer that this is the English theory, but whether it is or not, that government certainly would not, in the absence of treaty stipulations, surrender fugitives to a government which, like ours, would refuse to reciprocate its acts of comity in that respect.

The right of one government to demand and receive from another the custody of an offender who has sought asylum upon its soil, depends upon the existence of treaty stipulations between them, and in all cases is derived from, and is measured and restricted

by, the provisions, express and implied, of the treaty. The fugitive Hawes, by becoming an inhabitant of the Dominion of Canada, placed himself under the protection of British laws, and we could demand his surrender only in virtue of our treaty with that government, and we held him in custody for the purposes contemplated by that treaty, and for no other.

He was surrendered to the authorities of Kentucky. to be tried upon three several indictments for forgery, The Canadian authorities were of opinion that the evidences of his criminality were sufficient to justify his commitment for trial on said three charges. One of the charges the Commonwealth voluntarily abandoned. He was tried upon the remaining two, and found not guilty in each case by the jury, and now stands acquitted of the crimes for which he was extradited.

It is true he was in court, and in the actual custody of the officers of the law when it was demanded that he should be compelled to plead to the indictment for embezzlement. But the specific purposes for which the protection of the British laws had been withdrawn from him had been fully accomplished, and he claimed that, in view of that fact, the period of his extradition had been determined; that his further detention was not only unauthorized, but in violation of the stipulations of the treaty under which he was surrendered, and that the Commonwealth could not take advantage of the custody in which he was then wrongfully held, to try and punish him for a non-extraditable offense.

To all this, it was answered that "an offender against the justice of his country can acquire no rights by defrauding that justice." That "between him and the justice he has offended, no rights accrue to the offender by flight. He remains at all times, and everywhere, liable to be called to answer to the law for his violations thereof, provided he comes within the reach of its arm." Such is the doctrine of the cases of Caldwell and Lawrence (8th and 13th Blatchford's Reports), and of the case of Lagrave (59th New York). And if the cases of Caldwell and Lawrence could be freed from the complications arising out of the residence of the prisoners within the territorial limits of the British crown, and the fact that we received them from the authorities of the British government in virtue of, and pursuant to, treaty stipulations, it would be sound doctrine and indisputable law.

But did Caldwell or Lawrence come within the reach of the arms of our laws? They were surrendered to us by a foreign sovereign to be tried for specified crimes, and were forcibly brought for the purposes of those trials within the jurisdiction of our courts, and the point in issue was not whether the prisoners had secured immunity by flight, but whether the court could proceed to try them without disregarding the good faith of the government, and violating the "supreme law?"

The legal right of a judicial tribunal to exercise jurisdiction in a given case must, from the nature of things, be open to question at some stage of the proceeding, and we find it difficult to conceive of a person charged with crime being so situated as not to be permitted to challenge the power of the court assuming the right to try and punish him.

The doctrine of the cases of Caldwell and Lawrence has been sanctioned by several prominent British officials and lawyers, and has seemingly been acted upon by some of the Canadian courts, and in one instance (that of Heilbronn) by an English court.

We say

seemingly, for the reason that in Great Britain treaties are regarded as international compacts, with which in general the courts have no concern. They are to be carried into effect by the Executive, and the proceedings in the courts are subject to executive control to the extent necessary to enable it to prevent a breach of treaty stipulation in cases of this kind. Hence, when a party charged with crime claims immunity from trial on account of the provisions of the treaty under which he has been extradited, he must apply to the Executive to interfere, through the law officers of the Crown, to stay the action of the court; otherwise it will not, at his instance, stop to inquire as to the form of his arrest, nor as to the means by which he was taken into custody.

But a different rule prevails with us, because our government is differently organized. Neither the Federal nor State Executive could interfere to prevent or suspend the trial of Hawes. Neither the Commonwealth's Attorney nor the court was to any extent whatever subject to the direction or control either of the President of the United States or the Governor of this Commonwealth.

But the treaty under which the alleged immunity was asserted being part of the supreme law, the court had the power, and it was its duty, if the claim was well founded, to secure to him its full benefit.

The question we have under consideration has not been passed on by the Supreme Court of the United States, and it therefore so far remains an open one that we feel free to decide it in accordance with the results of our own investigations and reflections.

Mr. William Beach Lawrence, in the 14th volume of the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL, at page 96, on the authority of numerous European writers, said:

"All the right which a power asking an extradition can possibly derive from the surrender must be what is expressed in the treaty, and all rules of interpretation require the treaty to be strictly construed; and, consequently, when the treaty prescribes the offenses for which extradition can be made, and the particular testimony to be required, the sufficiency of which must be certified to the executive authority of the extraditing country, the State receiving the fugitive has no jurisdiction whatever over him, except for the specified crime to which the testimony applies."

This is the philosophy of the rule prevailing in France. The French Minister of Justice, in his circular of April 15, 1841, said: "The extradition declares the offense which leads to it, and this offense alone ought to be inquired into."

The rule, as stated by the German author Heffter, is, that "The individual whose extradition has been granted cannot be prosecuted nor tried for any crime except that for which the extradition has been obtained. To act in any other way, and to cause him to be tried for other crimes or misdemeanors, would be to violate the mutual principle of asylum, and the silent clause contained by implication in every extradition."

And when President Tyler expressed the opinion that the treaty of 1842 could not be used to secure the trial and punishment of persons charged with treason, libels, desertion from military service, and other like offenses, and when the British Parliament and the American Congress assumed to provide that the persons extradited by their respective governments should be surrendered "to be tried for the crime of which such person shall be so accused," this dominant principle of