[Sidenote:  Judgments of Prize Courts conclusive.]

The jurisdiction of the Court of the capturing nation is conclusive upon the question of property in the captured thing.  Its sentence settles all further dispute between claimants; and if that sentence is manifestly unjust, or against the Law of Nations, the state is alone responsible, and not the captors.  An unjust sentence is a good ground for issuing commissions of Reprisals.  Numerous treaties between the different powers of Europe, regulating the subject of Reprisals, declare that they shall not be granted, unless in case of the denial of justice.  “An unjust sentence,” says Wheaton, “must certainly be considered as a denial of justice, unless the mere privilege of being heard before condemnation is all that is included in the idea of justice."[106]

Thus the sentence of a Prize Court, it is plain, is sufficient to confirm the captor’s title to captures at sea; but a different rule applies to real property or immoveables.

Immoveable possessions, lands, towns, provinces, &c., become the property of the enemy who makes himself master of them; but it is only by the treaty of peace, or the entire subjugation and extinction of the state to which those towns and provinces belonged, that the acquisition is completed, and the property becomes stable and perfect.  Thus, a third party cannot safely purchase conquered land till the Sovran from whom it has been taken has renounced it by a treaty of peace, or has irretrievably lost his sovereignty.[107] Until such confirmation, it continues liable to be divested by the jus postliminii.  The purchaser of any portion takes it, at the peril of being evicted by the original Sovran owner, when he is restored to his dominions.[108]

I now pass on to the more commercial question of Passports, Safe-Conducts, and Licences to Trade.

SECTION III.

Licences.

[Sidenote:  Passports and Safe Conducts]

Passports, and Safe-conducts, are a kind of privilege, insuring safety to persons in passing and repassing, or to certain things during their conveyance from one place to another.  All Safe-conducts, like every other act of Supreme Command, emanate from the Sovran authority, but are constantly delegated to inferior officers, either by an express commission, or by a natural consequence of the nature of their functions.  The person named in the Passport cannot transfer his privilege to another.  They generally promise security wherever the grantor has authority and command, and are interpreted by the same rules of liberality and good faith, with other acts of the Sovran power.[109]

[Sidenote:  Licences to Trade with the Enemy]