dered to be dismissed. The case cited, Indiana v. Helmer, involved a question arising out of a bastardy proceeding in Indiana, under the statute of that State, which proceeding was matured into a judgment against the defendant in Indiana, and the suit in Iowa was against the same defendant, on the judgment. The judgment, though regularly authenticated, was, with the proceedings of the cause in Indiana, of so irregular a character that an attempt was made to avoid its force by showing it to have been obtained under the penal statutes of Indiana, and on the assumption that those statutes would not be enforced in another State. But the Iowa court, admitting that such would be the law if the proceeding was based on the Indiana statute, decided that the irregularities of the judgment did not void its validity while unreversed, and that as there was jurisdiction of the defendant in Indiana, the judgment itself would sustain the action and shut out all enquiry as to the subject matter on which it was rendered. In this case the court, COLE, J., say, however, as to the extra-territorial force of such statutes: "If the mother of the bastard child, begotten and born in the State of Indiana, had come to Iowa, and sought by legal proceedings to compel the defendant, its father, to support it, and to give bond therefor, and otherwise comply with the requirements of the statutes of Indiana, the answer of the defendant that the subject matter of such action was one of merely local police regulation of Indiana, and not enforceable in this State, would have been conclusive, and amount to a complete defense." The court then add that such action could no more be maintained beyond the limits of the sovereignty within which it arose than can an action for any other penalty provided by statute of such sovereignty for the wrongful act of a defendant therein; and that both are alike matters of local and internal police, and enforceable alone by the sovereignty making the regulation and providing the penalty. The case of Richardson v. Burlington was also a bastardy proceeding. The mother became enciente in the State of New Jersey, being a servant there, but not having gained a residence in any particular town; before the birth of the child she left the State and became an inhabitant of the State of Pennsylvania, in which latter State

1 22 Vt. 545, 546.

2

2 Indiana . Helmer, 21 Iowa, 370, 372.

66

the child was born. Still remaining a resident of Pennsylvania, she returned to New Jersey and instituted the prosecution against the alleged father; an order was made against him under the statute, which, on certiorari to the Supreme Court, was set aside on the ground that the case was not within the statute. The court say the statute "was not intended for the relief of other States or their townships;" nor was it intended to maintain the bastards of such lewd women as may come into a township and stay just long enough to become impregnated, and then depart, and afterwards, in some foreign jurisdiction, give birth to their illegitimate conceptions." In the Vermont case above cited, Graham v. Monsergh, the difficulty occurred in Canada; the child was born in New York, and the proceedings were set on foot in Vermont, where the alleged father was found. In the case cited from New Jersey, Richardson v. Burlington, the trouble originated in that State where the woman was temporarily in service; she afterwards became an inhabitant of Pennsylvania, and in that State the child was born. The mother then went temporarily into New Jersey, found the father of the child, and there commenced proceedings against him under the statute. It is seen that these bastardy statutes are regarded as penal statutes and police regulations, and that, having no extra-territorial force, they do not apply to cases occurring in other States; and that, on the other hand, the statutes of the other States, where the cases, by the births, occurred, had no force inside of the territorial limits of the States where the proceedings were invoked: that is, were not the law of the forum. In other terms, that all such penal and police statutes, on whatever subject, are local. In Wisconsin there is a contrary ruling, but it is put upon this principle, as alleged, the obligation to support the child arising from paternity, saying nothing about the statute or obligation of the statute. The case was this: Conception occurred in Wisconsin, but the birth occurred in Illinois; after a time the mother returned to Wisconsin and instituted proceedings under the statute against the alleged father. The court sustained the jurisdiction without making any reference to the statutory liability, but upon the general principle of an obligation of the parent, which, though recognized as to legitimate children, is not, as we con

1 33 N. J. 192.

ceive, except by statute, as to such as are illegitimate. In the Wisconsin case, the court having been referred to the case above cited, of Graham v. Monsergh, avoid the force thereof by resting their decision on the obligation of paternity alone. The court say, COLE, J.: "The obligation of the father to support a bastard child grows out of the paternal relations existing between him and such child, and we therefore deem it quite immaterial, so far as his obligation and duty are concerned, whether the child is born out of the State or not."1 We do not regard this Wisconsin case as an authority in a legal point of view, however strong the moral obligation. But, irrespective of its soundness, it does not militate against the principle assumed as law by us in the matter here under discussion, as to the extra-territorial enforcement of penal statutes.

The case of Slack v. Gibbs is another one strongly illustrative of the principle here asserted. By the statute of Vermont, a conveyance of property made to defraud creditors, is made a penal offense as against the parties to such conveyance. A debtor citizen of that State, being on his way, with horses for market, to Boston, made, as alleged, a fraudulent conveyance of them in New Hampshire, while passing through that State, and with intent to defraud his Vermont creditors. In an action for the penalty, instituted in a court of Vermont, the court held that such action would not lie, under the statute of Vermont, for a fraudulent conveyance made in another State; and, though the Supreme Court, on another point, reversed the judgment, they ruled, however, with the court below, that the action would not lie in a case where the act prohibited was committed in another State.2 In the same case, the Supreme Court of Vermont, WILLIAMS, J., say: "A conveyance of property, however fraudulently intended or conceived, made in another State, cannot be a breach of our penal laws, or subject the party to a penalty therefor. Our laws are of no efficacy out of the territorial limits of the State, and however immoral a transaction may be, committed in another jurisdiction, it cannot be punished here as a violation of the laws of this State."3

To the effect that the statutory actions of one State cannot be

'Duffies v. The State, 7 Wis. 672. 2 Slack v. Gibbs, 14 Vt. 357. And though it was a qui tam, yet such ac

tions in Vermont are civil actions. Waters v. Day, 10 Vt. 487.

3 Slack v. Gibbs, 14 Vt. 364.

enforced in another State, nor actions arising on statutory liabil ities, it is ruled in Vermont that the bond of a guardian taken in another State, in the probate court of such State, under a law prescribing the conditions and terms of liability thereon, cannot be enforced in a different State. In the case referred to, the court, PIERPONT, C. J., say: "The bond is purely a creature of the statute law of New Hampshire, taken according to its requirements, and for a purpose specified and declared by such law. The whole proceeding was understood and intended to be local in its operation, to be consummated in that State, and under its laws."1

*

*

There is a late ruling in Illinois that the expectant mother of an illegitimate child may follow the putative father into, and prosecute him in, that State, for bastardy, under the statute of Illinois, although she be a resident of another State, in which the trouble occurred, and of which both parties were citizens at the time the act was committed by which she became pregnant, and although the child be not yet born. The objection was raised, on the trial, that the complainant was not, and never had been, a citizen or resident of Illinois, but it was overruled by the lower court, and the judgment was affirmed in the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court say: "The case is certainly within the letter of the law. The majority of the court do not feel at liberty to hold that the operation of the statute is limited in this respect by implication." No authorities are cited.

It will not do to liken the inter-State right of suit, in statutory actions, though they be in their nature transitory in the State where they accrue, to the right to sue in transitory cases in different counties-suits in the same State where the actions accrue. In the latter case, the sovereignty is still the same, and the statute is in force in all the counties throughout the territorial boundaries of that sovereignty; whereas, in the former, the statute giving the right of action is of no force, in proprio vigore, outside of the State by which it is enacted.

Difference between Common Law and Statutory Transitory Actions. There is this difference, in that respect, as to the prosecution of common law rights of transitory actions in one State

Judge of Probate v. Hibbard, 44 Vt. 597; Pickering v. Fisk, 6 Vt. 102. 2 Koble v. People, 85 Ill. 336. The

court regarded the statute as intended mainly for the personal benefit of the

woman.

or country, which have accrued in another, and are of a personal and transitory character, and are based on contract rights or personal injuries recognized as such by the principles of universal law. These are maintainable in all countries, wherever there are tribunals that take cognizance of and vindicate such rights and injuries; not, however, because of the local law of such countries, but because of the universal law, which gives and vests such right of action, and which exists everywhere, whether locally enacted or not.1 In such case, although the remedy is given by the law of the forum, yet the right of action is given by, and bears relation to, a universal law of civilization; thus, if a man be assaulted or beaten on a previously unknown island, where there is no law, and on which the parties are casually thrown, yet a right of action therefor exists, and may be enforced, in any state or country where there are courts that adjudicate personal rights, if the aggressor is there found and served with the local process. So, if in such place hitherto unknown a contract, not immoral or wrong in itself, be made by parties, and for a valuable consideration, the right thereon, if of a transitory nature, by the common or civil law, may elsewhere be sued and enforced, in the courts of all countries where there are tribunals for the enforcement of personal rights, and this, too, upon the principle of universal law. The only question, in either case, is the question of comity, as to the right of an alien or citizen of another State to sue, if the plaintiff be such; but if the plaintiff be a citizen or subject of the State or country where the suit is brought, then no question whatever as to his right to legal redress can arise, except the necessity of making out a cause of recovery.

III. STATUTORY ACTIONS FOR DEATH OF A PERSON.

There is a species of actions, of modern origin, which are alike unknown to the common law and to the ordinary body of the qui tam and other statutory actions. Though local they are not real actions: though personal, they are not transitory. They are given by statute, are of a police nature, and can only be brought and enforced in the State where the statute that gives them, and

1 Gardner v. Thomas, 14 John. 135; Johnson v. Dalton, 1 Cow. 543; McKenna v. Fiske, 1 How. 241.