The general principles to which I have been referring have been declared applicable to the States of this Union. While recognizing the central federal authority, resulting from the Constitution of the United States, they hold in regard to each other, with the exception of the cases governed by that instrument, the position of independent and foreign powers. So it has been held, that bills drawn in one of the States on persons in another, are to be treated as foreign bills; and the Supreme Court of the United States has said, "For all purposes embraced by the federal constitution, the States and the citizens thereof are one, united under the same sovereign authority, and governed by the same laws. In all other respects, the States are necessarily foreign to and independent of each other, their constitutions and forms of government being, although republican, altogether different, as are their laws and institutions," and their acts have, consequently, no extraterritorial authority. But at the same time, the States of the Union recognize in regard to each other, to a certain extent, the existence of the same principles of international comity which, with reference to nations wholly independent of each other, we have already attempted to define. In a case, very elaborately argued in the Supreme Court of the United States, where suit was brought in the State of Alabama by a bank incorporated by the State of Georgia, on a bill of exchange negotiated to the agent of the plaintiffs within the State of * Buckner vs. Finley, 2 Peters, 586. See, to same point, Lonsdale vs. Brown, 4 Wash. C. R., 86, and 2 Peters, approving, p. 688. Warder vs. Adrell, 2 Wash. R., 283. Bank of U. S. vs. Daniel et al., 12 Peters, p. 82; and State of Rhode Island vs. Massachusetts, 12 Peters, p. 657. + Blanchard vs. Russell, 13 Mass., 1. Peters, 519. Opinion of Taney, p. 584. Bassford, 6 Hill, p. 527. Bank of Augusta vs. Earle, 13 Commonwealth of Kentucky vs. Alabama, it was insisted, that a corporation could not contract in any State of the Union but in that by the law of which it was created, and that its existence would not be recognized on any principle of comity; and the Circuit Court of the United States so decided; but on writ of error to the Supreme Court, the judgment was reversed,* the Court holding this language:- "It has, however, been supposed that the rules of comity between foreign nations do not apply to the States of this Union; that they extend to one another no other rights than those which are given by the Constitution of the United States; and that the courts of the general government are not at liberty to presume, in the absence of all legislation on the subject, that a State has adopted the comity of nations. towards the other States as a part of its jurisprudence, or that it acknowledges any rights but those which are secured by the Constitution of the United States. The Court think otherwise. The intimate union of these States as members of the same great political family, the deep and vital interests which bind them so closely together, should lead us, in the absence of proof to the contrary, to presume a greater degree of comity, and friendship, and kindness toward one another, than we should be authorized to presume between foreign nations. And when (as without doubt must occasionally happen) the interest or policy of any State requires it to restrict the rule, it has but to declare its will, and the legal presumption is at once at an end. But until this is done, upon what grounds could this court refuse to administer the law of international comity between these States? They are soyereign States; and the history of the past, and the events which are daily occurring, furnish the strongest evidence that they have adopted toward each other the laws of comity in their fullest extent." It was certainly very difficult successfully to contend for the principle insisted on in this case by the defendants, for it amounted substantially to the proposition that a corporation of one State can do no commercial business, can make no contract, can, indeed, do * Bank of Augusta vs. Earle, 13 Peters, 519. Mr. Justice McKinley dissented. nothing in any other State of the Union but in that in which, by the law of the State, it has been created. But the doctrine of comity between the States, presents itself in other and more important aspects. So in regard to slavery, the question has arisen whether the owner of slaves which are brought from a State where domestic servitude is allowed, and taken into a State where that institution is absolutely forbidden by its municipal legislation, can be protected in his property by the fact that the slaves are merely in transitu, and brought in with the bona fide intention of taking them to some State where their proprietor may lawfully hold them. This proposition has been affirmed in Illinois ;* it has been denied in New York,t and has been left in doubt by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. It is not seriously asserted that the owner's right can be maintained under the Constitution of the United States, nor that in this sense the absolute prohibition of domestic slavery by the State laws is unconstitutional; but it is very earnestly insisted that property in slaves under these circumstances, is protected by the doctrine of comity which we have above discussed. The point is very far from being free of difficulty, and if the rule of comity is to be considered as settled to the full extent of the language of the Supreme Court above cited, it will be difficult to show that it does not cover this case; but before it shall be so finally determined, much reflection is necessary. The doctrine of comity has been established and applied by powers wholly foreign, entirely distinct from and independent of each other, the mutual relations of * Willard vs. The People, 4 Scammon, 461. whose citizens are comparatively rare, and almost, if not quite, exclusively commercial, and the rules of whose intercourse rest entirely on the great unwritten law of nations, of which this comity forms in fact but a part. Such is not at all the condition of the States of this Union. They are mutually dependent on each other in various ways, and all recognize in certain cases, a common sovereign; their intercourse is in the highest degree frequent and intimate; their relations quite as much political as commercial; and they have undertaken by the terms of a carefully prepared instrument, to declare with precision, their relative rights and duties. In this case, to substitute for the clear and definite language of the Constitution any thing so vague and uncertain as the comity of nations, is not only to subject the relations and independence of the States to a condition of alarming perplexity, but to make the judiciary the sole arbiter of the gravest political questions, and to give them, in framing their decisions, no better guide than a fluctuating and unsettled notion of international courtesy. The federal Constitution contains a provision in regard to the laws of the States, and the judicial proceedings of their tribunals, which, though it gives them no extra-territorial effect, has still some bearing on our present subject. The Constitution of the United States, by Article IV. Section 1 of that instrument, declares that, "Full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other State; and the Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof." In pursuance of this of this power, the Congress of the United States, by act of May 26, 1790, ch. 38, provided the mode by which records and judicial proceedings should be authenticated. Under these constitutional and statutory provisions, various decisions have been made, the general result of which is, that a judgment is conclusive in every other State, if a court of the particular State where it was rendered would hold it so.* But Congress has never acted on the power in the Constitution as to the public acts or laws of the States, any further than to declare that they shall be authenticated by having the seal of the respective States affixed thereto; nor is this method regarded as exclusive of any other which the States may adopt. And the States have differed as to the manner in which they should be proved. In some cases, strict proof of them, as foreign laws, has been required; but the courts of other States, and the Supreme Court of the United States, influenced by the peculiar and intimate connection of the States, have shown a disposition to relax the usual rules of proof in this respect; in regard, however, to the details of this matter, which properly belongs to the domain of evidence, I refer the reader to Mr. Greenleaf's very valuable work, where the authorities will be found collected.§ The student of American law, in his consideration of the subject which we are now discussing, will not forget that the laws of the States, as has been already intimated, are subject in many important cases to * Mills vs. Duryee, 7 Cranch, 481. Hampton vs. McConnel, 3 Wheat., 234. 1 Kent Comm., p. 250, and cases there cited. † Act of 26th May, 1790, ch. 38. Bank of Augusta vs. Earle, 13 Peters, 525. Ogden, arguendo. § Greenleaf on Evidence, § 489. |