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A review of the system of jurisdiction over special groups of foreigners in Siam, if, indeed, the medley of arrangements can be called a system, falls quite naturally into three periods, and for this and other reasons it has seemed more satisfactory to consider the treaties in chronological order rather than to attempt to group them according to topics or by countries. The first of these periods ended with the signing of the British treaty of 1855. The second began in 1855 and ended in 1874 when the treaty with the Government of India was executed, a period of the establishment of consular jurisdiction. The third period, one of the modification of consular jurisdiction, is not yet finished but began in 1874 when the first changes in the régime of exterritoriality were made.1

PRIOR TO 1855

The student of the early Siamese treaties is very much handicapped by the fact that the records of the kingdom were destroyed when Ayuthia, then the capital, was taken and destroyed by the Burmese in 1767. Such records as exist of the international relations of the country before that time can now be found only in the archives of European states and these have not yet been thoroughly searched. Therefore, a study of the documents prior to 1767 must necessarily be incomplete. However, from materials recovered in Europe, together with the somewhat meager descriptions of the system which then prevailed, which are to be found in such contemporary writings as have been printed, some idea can be gathered of the system of jurisdiction over foreigners in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries.2

The Portuguese, the first Europeans to come in any considerable number, arrived early in the sixteenth century. They were followed, after a long interval, by the Dutch, and in the early part of the seventeenth century came the English, and about 1662, the French. Danish traders appeared in Tenasserim, then a part of Siam, in 1621, but apparently their stay was short. There were, also, during the seventeenth century, considerable groups of Asiatic peoples, Armenians, Persians, Indians, Malays and others. As a result of the religious persecutions in Japan, a large number of Japanese

1 A collection of State Papers of the Kingdom of Siam, 1664-1886, compiled by the Siamese Legation in Paris, was published in London in 1886. Since then no other official collection has appeared, though one is now in course of preparation. A collection, unofficial and incomplete, was published in Bangkok in 1915 by the Bangkok Times, an English newspaper. Wolcott H. Pitkin, Esq., of the New York bar, formerly Adviser in Foreign Affairs to the Siamese Government, has prepared and printed a very useful but unfortunately incomplete collection of treaties as a supplement to his brief, Siam's Case for the Revision of Obsolete Treaty Obligations.

2 Many of the references to jurisdiction in the early accounts of Siam have been collected by M. Louis Duplatre, Assistant Legal Adviser in the Siamese Ministry of Justice, in his thesis for the University of Grenoble, Condition des Étrangers au Siam. Anderson's English Intercourse with Siam in the Seventeenth Century is a very useful book. See, also, Records of the Relations between Siam and Foreign Countries in the 17th Century, published by the Bajirañana National Library, Bangkok.

Christians settled in the country about the middle of the seventeenth century. Of course, there were always the Chinese.

No treaties or conventions with the Portuguese during the period under consideration have yet been found, but doubtless there were such and a thorough search of the archives in Portugal and Macao might disclose many documents of interest.

There was in existence in the seventeenth century, a system, which undoubtedly antedated that century, but whether founded originally upon treaty stipulations is now unknown, under which the various national groups were permitted to live in "camps", over each of which was placed a "captain" chosen by his own people with the approval of the king. This captain was the judge in all differences among his nationals but was responsible for all his actions to a Siamese official designated for that purpose. The captain, or as he was sometimes called, the "amphur", which is the title of a subordinate Siamese administrative official at the present time, seems to have been subject in all respects to Siamese jurisdiction, and, indeed, although a foreigner, was regarded as a Siamese functionary, having no official relation to the government to his own country.

3

The earliest treaty containing references to jurisdiction, of which the writer knows, is that with the Dutch United East India Company, acting under the authority of the States-General of the United Netherlands. This treaty, which was signed at Ayuthia on August 22, 1664, after granting to the company certain trading monopolies, provided that, should any of the company's servants commit a grave crime in Siam, neither the king nor the Siamese courts should judge him but he must be delivered to the company's chief to be punished according to Dutch law. If the chief himself committed a capital crime, he was to be kept under arrest by the king until notice had been given to the governor-general. Dutch traders were thus made exempt from Siamese jurisdiction in cases of grave crimes committed by them and this exemption extended even to crimes against the Siamese themselves. In 1662, a company of French missionaries came to Siam and was received with great cordiality, for the kings of Siam have been without exception extremely tolerant in religious matters. Misconstruing this friendliness, the missionaries persuaded themselves that the king's conversion to Christianity was a possibility and, upon their return to France, they succeeded in interesting Louis XIV in the project of establishing, at one stroke, both the Christian religion and French influence where neither had before existed. Ambassadors from Siam were, also, received by Louis and their reports to the king of Siam assisted greatly in aiding the French attempt. An embassy, headed by M. de Chaumont, was ultimately dispatched to Siam and on December 10, 1685, a treaty was signed at Lopburi which dealt ex

Siamese State Papers, p. 233; also, Records of Relations between Siam and Foreign Countries in the 17th Century, Vol. 2, p. 66.

Siamese State Papers, p. 239.

clusively with matters of religion. The next day, December 11, 1685, another treaty, unpublished as yet, this time a commercial one, was executed by the Siamese and French plenipotentiaries.

The first treaty granted the missionaries the privilege of preaching the Christian law in Siam and guaranteed tolerance for such converts as might be made. The French request that, in order to avoid any attempts at the persecution of converts, a qualified Siamese "mandarin" might be appointed to hear and judge all such cases, was granted but with the qualification that the mandarin must refer such matters to one of the judges of the king before passing sentence. It was, also, agreed that if the missionaries did not transgress the privileges conferred upon them by the treaty, their affairs should be judged by a mandarin presented by the bishop but appointed by the king.

The second treaty of M. de Chaumont contains a request that the French servants of the Compagnie des Indes Orientales, as well as the French not connected with that company, who were not in the service of the king, might be judged as to disputes among themselves by the captain of the company, who was, also, to have authority to punish any of the French guilty of theft. The king, responding to this request, granted that the French, not in his service or in that of his ministers, who committed theft or any other culpable act, should be left for punishment to the French captain. If any one of the parties should not be satisfied with the judgment of the captain and should request that justice should be done by the king's ministers, the execution of the judgment should be stayed until the king of France had been informed and had given directions. If any of the servants of the company should commit any act worthy of judicial consideration, whether civil or criminal, against any one not French, the French captain was to sit with the Siamese judges to determine the case according to the laws of Siam. The king expressed the belief, however, that it would be better if a French judge should be appointed as this would relieve the officers of the company of a burden which might interfere with their commercial duties.

The provisions of this treaty were not completely satisfactory to France, and in 1687 another embassy, headed by MM. de la Loubère and Ceberet, was sent to Siam. This mission negotiated another treaty," which was signed at Lopburi on December 11, 1687. In this, the principal officer of the company was given full jurisdiction in all disputes, both civil and criminal, in which only individuals in the company's service were involved, whether French or of any other nationality. If one of the parties was not in the service of the company, the jurisdiction remained in the king of Siam, but the principal officer of the company was to have the right to sit in the court and to have a definite voice in the determination of the case, after taking an oath to judge according to right and justice.

Journal of the Siam Society, Vol. 14, part 2, pp. 23, 30.

The Siamese plenipotentiary in the treaties negotiated by M. de Chaumont was the famous Constantine Phaulcon, a Greek, who had been brought to Siam in an English ship, probably as a cabin boy, and had risen, after several unsuccessful adventures on his own account, in one of which he was shipwrecked, to the high position of favorite and chief minister of the king. Not without some reason, he came to be suspected of secret dealings with the French and, shortly after the treaty of 1687, the Siamese nobles, alarmed by the presence of French troops in the country, rose in revolt. Phaulcon was killed and, the king opportunely dying, the dynasty was changed and the French efforts came to nothing.

During most of the eighteenth century, Siam was occupied with civil war and with invasions by the Burmese. In 1757, the Burmese took the province of Tenasserim and ten years later Ayuthia fell. The capital was transferred to Bangkok and the first king of the present dynasty, the Chakri, was called to the throne in 1782. The new king, officially known today as Rama I, building upon the work of his immediate predecessor, who had not founded a dynasty, restored the country to a condition of peace, and relations with the European world, largely, if not entirely, suspended during most of the previous century, were resumed early in the nineteenth.

Perhaps in 1820, certainly about that time, the Portuguese sent an envoy who may have made a treaty. If he did, the text has been lost. However, he obtained permission to trade and consent was given for the establishment of a consulate, the first in Siam. The success of the experiment must have been doubtful for no other consulates were established until 1855, under the terms of the British treaty of that year.

About the same time, the British were trying to secure a commercial treaty. An attempt in 1822 failed, but in 1826, on June 20, a treaty, the first with Great Britain of which there is certain knowledge, was signed. No provision was made for a consul and the treaty provided that English and Siamese when in the country of the other must conduct themselves according to the established laws of that country, Siam or England, in every particular.

Shortly afterwards, on March 20, 1833, a treaty' with the United States was signed at Bangkok, which provided that: "Merchants of the United States trading in the Kingdom of Siam shall respect and follow the laws and customs of the country in all points."

This was the last treaty, so far as is known, entered into by Siam prior to the establishment of consular jurisdiction in 1855. While the treaties of the seventeenth century undoubtedly contained the germs of an exterritorial system, they had long since become obsolete and inoperative and it is not, therefore, too much to say that in 1855 exterritoriality was unknown in Siam. 'British and Foreign State Papers, Vol. 23, p. 1153.

'Ibid., Vol. 20, p. 590. There had been American ships engaged in trade with Siam since 1818.

1855-1874

8

On April 18, 1855, there was signed at Bangkok a new treaty with Great Britain, the effect of which was to establish a radically different system of jurisdiction. This treaty, generally known as the Bowring treaty, after the British envoy, Sir John Bowring, at that time the governor of Hongkong, provided that:

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II. The interests of all British subjects coming to Siam shall be placed under the regulation and control of a consul, who will be appointed to reside at Bangkok. Any dispute arising between Siamese and British subjects shall be heard and determined by the consul, in conjunction with the proper Siamese officers; and criminal offences will be punished, in the case of English offenders, by the consul, according to English laws, and in the case of Siamese offenders, by their own laws through the Siamese authorities. But the consul shall not interfere in any matters referring solely to Siamese, neither will the Siamese authorities interfere in questions which concern only the subjects of Her Britannic Majesty.

On May 13, 1856, an agreement 10 supplementary to the treaty of 1855 was executed in which were made certain explanations and amplifications of the provisions of that treaty. By Article II of this agreement, it was established:

That all criminal cases in which both parties are British subjects, or in which the defendant is a British subject, shall be tried and determined by the British Consul alone.

That all civil cases in which both parties are British subjects, or in which the defendant is a British subject, shall be heard and determined by the British Consul alone.

That whenever a British subject has to complain against a Siamese he must make his complaint through the British Consul, who will lay it before the proper Siamese authorities.

That in all cases in which British or Siamese subjects are interested, the Siamese authorities in the one case, and the British Consul in the other, shall be at liberty to attend at, and listen to, the investigation of the case; and copies of the proceedings will be furnished from time to time, or when ever desired, to the Consul or the Siamese authorities, until the case is concluded.

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That although the Siamese may interfere so far with British subjects as to call upon the Consul to punish grave offences when committed by British subjects, it is agreed that, British subjects, their persons, houses, premises, lands, ships, or property of any kind, shall not be seized, injured or in any way interfered with by the Siamese.

It was, also, agreed in Article III, that in case a British subject died in Siam, his property was to go to his heirs according to English law and the British and Foreign State Papers, Vol. 46, p. 138.

'An account of his mission to Siam is given by Sir John Bowring in his The Kingdom and People of Siam.

10 British and Foreign State Papers, Vol. 46, p. 146.

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