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under cover of that relaxation of prize law, to smother the principle, by placing themselves out of reach of its restraints.

"An adherence to the old rule would therefore seem to be still exacted, in its full simplicity, in one of its cardinal features, which is, that the neu tral vessel shall make her inquiries so plainly clear of the blockaded port, that she shall not acquire the ability (as Chancellor Kent phrases the act) to 'slip herself into it.'

"Phillimore states the general result of the au thorities to be, that 'it has never, under any circumstances, been held legal that the inquiry shall be made at the very mouth of the river or estuary of the blockaded port' (3 Phillimore, 399, § 304).

"Dr. Lushington says, in the case of The Union, 1 Spinkes, P. C., 164, 'the claimants allege the vessel was chartered for Riga, and being uncertain whether the place was blockaded or not, they sent her to Riga to inquire of the blockading force whether Riga was blockaded. Is this justifiable? Under particular circumstances, perhaps, it may be justifiable, where information cannot be otherwise procured, to inquire of the blockading squadron; but the excuse can never prevail, if a neutral port be accessible, though an inquiry there might be attended with great loss and expense to the neutral ship.'

"Without further extending the examination into this branch of the defence, it is clear to my mind, that the claimants cannot lawfully, under claim of making inquiry if a port known to the vessel to have been under blockade when her voy age was set on foot, and after she had been prose

cuting it toward the port, go forward to the entrance of the port, and within the actual line of the blockading force, to inquire as to the existence of the blockade, and that such act, by the law of na tions, subjects her to condemnation as prize of war."

In deciding the question of the construction of the Executive proclamation, in the case of The Admiral, on appeal to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Third Circuit, from the decree of condemnation of the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the . learned Circuit Judge says:

"The Admiral, with full knowledge that her destined port is blockaded, takes a clearance for St. Johns, and is found a thousand miles from the proper course to such a port, and in the act of entering the blockaded port, and when thus arrested for the first time, inquires if such blockade is raised."

"A vessel which has full knowledge of the existence of a blockade, before she enters on her voyage, has no right to claim a warning or indorsement when taken in the act of attempting to enter."

"It would be an absurd construction of the President's proclamation, to require a notice to be given to those who already had knowledge. A notification is for those only who have sailed without a knowledge of the blockade, and get that first information from the blockading vessels."

The purpose of a belligerent blockade being to interdict all commercial intercourse and trade with the enemy, such blockade is deemed violated by

any act on the part of neutrals, the obvious effect of which is, to defeat that purpose.

It has, therefore, been held in the cases before cited, and may be considered as established law, that a neutral vessel lying in a blockaded port, unladen or laden, at the time of the institution of the blockade, may thus depart, without infraction of the belligerent right; but that the act of taking in a cargo, after the blockade is established and known, is of itself a violation of the blockade, subjecting the property to confiscation.

This doctrine has been expressly recognized and applied in several cases adjudicated during the existing war in the United States.1

In the leading case of The Tropic Wind, decided in the Federal court for the District of Columbia, upon this point the learned judge says:

"All the testimony concurs in showing that the cargo was laden on board The Tropic Wind on the 13th and 14th days of May, 1861. No principle of prize law seems better settled than that such lading violates the blockade and forfeits both vessel and cargo. In 'Weldman, on Search, Capture, and Prize,' p. 42, the act of egress is declared to be as culpable as the act of ingress; and a blockade is just as much violated by a ship passing outward as inward. A blockade is intended to suspend the entire commerce of the place, and a neutral is no more at liberty to assist the traffic of exportation than of importation. The utmost that can be allowed to a neutral vessel is, that, having already taken in a cargo before the blockade begins, she may be at lib

1

Vide The Hiawatha, The Lynchburg, The Crenshaw, MS. Do sions U. S. Dist. Ct., New York.

erty to retire with it. If she afterward takes on board a cargo, it is a fraudulent act, and a violation of the blockade. It is lawful for a ship to withdraw from a blockaded port in ballast, or with a cargo shipped bona fide before notice of the block ade.' (See also Vrouw Judith, 1 Robinson, 150; The Juno, 2 Robinson, 119; The Nostra Senhora, 5 Robinson, 52.) In Weldman's International. Law,' volume 2d, p. 205, we find this passage: "Where the blockade is known at the port of shipment, the master becomes an agent for the cargo; in such case, the owners must, at all events, answer to the country imposing the blockade, for the acts of persons employed by them; otherwise, by sacrificing the ship, there would be a ready escape for the cargo, for the benefit of which the fund was intended.'" (See also The James Cook, Edwards, 261; The Arthur, ib., 202; The Exchange, ib., 40; 1st Kent., 2d edition, 144, 146; Olivera vs. Union Insurance Company, 3d Wheat. Rep., 194. See also Wheaton's note to the same case.)

The principle upon this point, to be extracted from the authorities, may be thus briefly stated:A belligerent blockade is designed to interdict exportation from, as well as importation to, the blockaded port. The act of taking on board a cargo in a blockaded port-even though not followed by an overt attempt at egress, is of itself a violation of the belligerent right, subjecting the property to condemnation-because it is an act of direct assistance of the traffic of exportation-the presumption of intent to violate the blockade-in the absence of countervailing evidence, from the mere fact of taking in a cargo.

Distinction be

tween the

belligerent

right, recog

national law,

claimed by the

a portion of its

the effects of

tion.

The intelligent reader cannot fail to perceive blockade as a that the blockade ordered by the proclamations of the President of the United States, of the 19th nized by inter- and 27th of April, 1861 (vide appendix), of the and that pro- ports of that portion of the territory of the United United States States whose people are in a condition of insurrec government of tion against the government, bears no resemblance, own ports, and in purpose or character, to the blockade known to that distinc- the law of nations, and recognized as one of the rights of war, which sovereign belligerent nations may exercise against each other. The established rules by which the questions are determined, of what constitutes a violation of a blockade, and what are the penalties for such violation, would no doubt be alike applicable-but here all analogy ceases. To the failure to perceive, or at least to acknowledge, this entire want of analogy, a failure which cannot but be regarded as singularly unac. countable in such distinguished publicists as the Earl of Ellenborough, the Earl of Derby, and Lord Brougham (vide Debates in the British House of Lords, of May 16, 1861), may be fairly attributed the unfortunate position assumed by the British gov ernment toward the rebellion existing in the United States.

The blockade known and recognized as such by the law of nations, is the exercise of the right possessed by belligerent nations as a lawful right of war, to close the ports of its adversary by an effic ient force, thereby to inflict a blow upon its trade and commerce, and so to cripple its means and resources, as eventually to compel a pacification by a reparation of those injuries which constituted the causa belli.

When a nation, for any cause, sees fit

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