general exemption. For it has been held, both by our common lawyers and civilians[1], that an embaſſador is privileged by the law of nature and nations; and yet, if he commits any offence againſt the law of reaſon and nature, he ſhall loſe his privilege[2]: and that therefore, if an embaſſador conſpires the death of the king in whoſe land he is, he may be condemned and executed for treaſon; but if he commits any other ſpecies of treaſon, it is otherwiſe, and he muſt be ſent to his own kingdom[3]. And theſe poſitions ſeem to be built upon good appearance of reaſon. For ſince, as we have formerly ſhewn, all municipal laws act in ſubordination to the primary law of nature, and, where they annex a puniſhment to natural crimes, are only declaratory of and auxiliary to that law; therefore to this natural, univerſal rule of juſtice embaſſadors, as well as other men, are ſubject in all countries; and of conſequence it is reaſonable that, wherever they tranſgreſs it, there they ſhall be liable to make atonement[4]. But, however theſe principles might formerly obtain, the general practice of this country, as well as of the reſt of Europe, ſeems now to purſue the ſentiments of the learned Grotius, that the ſecurity of embaſſadors is of more importance than the puniſhment of a particular crime[5]. And therefore few, if any, examples have happened within a century paſt, where an embaſſador has been puniſhed for any offence, however atrocious in it’s nature.
In reſpect to civil ſuits, all the foreign juriſts agree, that neither an embaſſador, nor any of his train or comites, can be proſecuted for any debt or contract in the courts of that kingdom wherein he is ſent to reſide. Yet ſir Edward Coke maintains, that, if an embaſſador make a contract which is good jure gentium, he ſhall anſwer for it here[6]. But the truth is, ſo few caſes (if any) had ariſen, wherein the privilege was either claimed or diſputed, even with regard to civil ſuits, that our law-books are
