2.
The United States have always been represented by ministers
plenipotentiary, never having sent a person of the rald of an,
ambassador in the diplomatic sense. 1 Kent's Com. 39, n.
3.
Ambassadors, when acknowledged as such, are exempted, absolutely from
all allegiance, and from all responsibility to the laws. If, however,
they should be so regardless of their duty, and of the object of their
privilege, as to insult or openly to attack the laws of the government,
their functions may be suspended by a refusal to treat with them, or
application can be made to their own sovereign for their recall, or they
may be dismissed, and required to depart within a reasonable time. By
fiction of law, an ambassador is considered as if he were out of the
territory of the foreign power; and it is an implied agreement among
nations, that the ambassador, while he resides in the foreign state,
shall be considered as a member of his own country, and the government
he represents has exclusive cognizance of his conduct, and control of
his person. The attendants of the ambassador are attached to his person,
and the effects in his use are under his protection and privilege, and,
generally, equally exempt from foreign jurisdiction.
4.
Ambassadors are ordinary or extraordinary. The former designation is
exclusively applied to those sent on permanent missions; the latter, to
those employed on particular or extraordinary occasions, or residing at a
foreign court for an indeterminate period. Vattel, Droit des Gens, 1.
4, c. 6, 70-79.
5.
The act of dtigress of April 30th, 1790, s. 25, makes void any writ or
process sued forth or prosecuted against any ambassador authorized and
received by the president of the United States, or any domestic servant
of such ambassador; and the 25th section of the same act, punishes any
person who shall sue forth or proseeute such writ or process, and all
attorneys – and soliciters prosecuting or soliciting in such case, and
all officers executing such writ or process, with an imprisonment not
exceeding three years, and a fine at the discretion of the court. The
act provides that citizens or inhabitants of the United States who were
indebted when they went into the service of an ambassador, shall not be
protected as to such debt; and it requires also that the names of such
servants shall be registered in the office of the secretary of state.
The 16th section imposes the like punishment on any person offering
violence to the person of an ambassador or other minister. P Vide 1
Kent, Com. 14, 38, 182; Rutherf. Inst. b. 2, c. 9; Vatt. b. 4, c. 8, s.
113; 2 Wash. C. C. R. 435; Ayl. Pand. 245; 1 Bl. Com. 253; Bac. Ab. h.
t.; 2 Vin. Ab. 286; Grot. lib. 2, c. 8, 1, 3; 1 Whart. Dig. 382; 2 Id.
314; Dig. l. 50, t. 7; Code I. 10, t. 63, l. 4; Bouv. Inst. Index, h. t.
6.
The British statute 7 Ann, cap. 12; is similar in its provisions; it
extends to the family and servants of an ambassador, as well when they
are the natives of the country in which the ambassador resides, as when
they are foreigners whom he brings with him. (3 Burr. 1776-7) To
constitute a domestic servant within the meaning of the statute, it is
not necessary that the servant should lodge, at night in the house of
the ambassador, but it is necessary to show the nature of the service he
renders and the actual performance of it. 3 Burr. 1731; Cases Temp.
Hardw. 5. He must, in fact, prove that he is bona fide the ambassador's
servant. A land waiter at the custom house is not such, nor entitled to
the privilege of the statute. 1 Burr. 401. A trader is not entitled to
the protection of the statute. 3 Burr. 1731; Cases Temp. Hardw. 5. A
person in debt cannot be taken into an ambassador's service in order to
protect him. 3 Burr. 1677.
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