Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/209

 I N T I N T 197 The main object of this article has been to exhibit the law of nations as much as possible in the form of a positive system of rules binding on states inter se, to assimilate the treatment of the subject to a statement of the ordinary rules of positive law. Many topics have therefore been omitted which are discussed at length in treatises on international law. It is not always possible to say where international law begins and international morality ends, but it is of the highest importance to mark the distinction. The former, taken broadly, means the rules of conduct that the nations of the civilized world admit and insist upon as a matter of course, and the fact that there are such rules is the central fact of the whole subject. Every addition to them is a positive good to the whole world, and such additions are for the most part to be traced to the reasonings of private thinkers. But to treat principles supported only by the authority of jurists, how ever distinguished, as of equal validity with those which have been adopted by the universal practice of nations is to weaken the one without strengthening the other. It should be said, moreover, that the systematic study of international law with a view to its improvement by jurists of all countries organized in societies like the Institut de Droit International at once tends to mature opinion and o give it an immediate hold on the practice of nations. Among the purely speculative questions connected with international law two deserve special notice on account of the extent to which they have engaged the sympathies at least of the best minds in every age. One is the project for a perpetual peace, the other is the more immediately practical proposal to reduce the law of nations to a written code. With the former the names of Bentham and of Kant are associated. Bentham s plan is a congress of deputies, two from each state, which should determine international disputes, and the decrees of which should be enforced against any state that might resist them by the combined power of the rest. As a preliminary condition he requires the reduction of military establishments and the abandonment by European nations of their colonies. Kant proposes a confederation of states, all under a republican constitution, and acting in international affairs through congresses to be held from time to time. An account of these and other projects of the same kind will be found in Wheaton s History of the Laiv of Nations. Codification would effect for the law of nations, as a whole, what has already been done for portions of it by the St Petersburg and Geneva conventions, and even by the treaties of Paris and Washington. All states are alike interested in ascertaining the rules to which they have assented in general terms. The work has already been to a great extent performed by private associations, and what is wanted is the formal ratification of their labours by the Governments of the world. The following are the most authoritative modern works on In ternational Law : Henry Wheaton s Elements of International Law (8th American edition published in 1866 with notes by R. H. Dana, jun. ; an English edition appeared in 1880) ; Sir Robert Phillimorc s Commentaries on International Law, in 4 vols. (a very complete and elaborate work) ; Sir Travers Twiss s Law of Nations, 2 vols. ; and Heffter s Das Europaisclie Volkerrccht der Gerjemvart. To these may be added the less important treatises of Richard Wildman, William Oke Manning, and H. W. Halleck (American). Useful elementary works are Chancellor Kent s Commentary, which has been edited in England by Dr J. T. Abdy ; T. D. Woolsey s Introduction to the Study of Interna tional Law ; and W. E. Hall s International Law. The history of the law of nations has been treated by Wheaton, Ward, K. von Mohl, and F. Laurent. (E. H.) INTERPLEADER, in English law, is the form of action used when a person is sued at law for the recovery of money or goods wherein he has no interest, and which are also claimed of him by some third party. Originally the only relief available to the possessor against such adverse claims was by means of a bill of interpleader in equity. The Interpleader Act, 1 & 2 Will. IV. c. 58, enabled the defendant in such cases, on application to the court, to have the original action stayed and converted into a trial between the two claimants. The Common Law Procedure Act of I860 further extended the power of the common law courts in interpleader ; and the Judicature Act, 1875, enacts that the practice and procedure under these two statutes shall apply to all divisions of the high court of justice. The Judicature Act also extends the remedy of interpleader to a debtor or other person liable in respect of a debt alleged to be assigned, when the assignment is disputed. Inter pleader is the equivalent of multiplepoinding in Scotch law. INTESTACY. In dealing with the property of a person who dies without making a will, the law of England dis tinguishes sharply between his real and his personal estate. The devolution of the former is regulated by the rules of INHERITANCE (q.v.). The destination of the latter is marked out by the Statute of Distributions. The proper conditions of a testamentary disposition of property will be found under the heading WILL. The distribution of an intestate s personal estate is carried out under the authority of administrators, whose duties are generally the same as those of executors under a will. Administration was until quite recently a matter cognizable by the ecclesiastical courts, and the ordinary was in fact the administrator until the passing of the 31 Edw. III. st. i. c. 11. An earlier statute (Westminster 2) directed against the abuses, of the system required the ordinary, instead of applying the residue of the estate to &quot; pious uses,&quot; to pay the debts of the intestate. The Act of Edward III. went further in providing that &quot; in case where a man dieth intestate, the ordinaries shall depute of the next and most lawful friends of the dead person intestate ta administer his goods,&quot; with power to sue for debts due to the deceased, and under obligation to pay debts due by him, and to answer to the ordinary like executors in the case of testament. Administrators remained on this foot ing of deputies appointed by the ordinary until the Probate Act transferred the jurisdiction in administration of the ecclesiastical courts to the new court of probate. The courts of law having held that by the grant of administration the authority of the ecclesiastical courts was exhausted, the administrator became entitled to the privilege, similar to that formerly enjoyed by the ordinary, of dealing as he pleased with residue of the estate. The next of kin of the same degree of relationship with the deceased were thus aggrieved by the preference of the administrator, and it was to remedy this grievance that the Statute of Distributions (22 and 23 Charles II. c. 10) was passed. It empowered the ordinary to take a bond from the administrator binding him to make a fair and complete distribution of the estates among the next of kin. Such distribution is to be in the following manner : one-third to the wife of the intestate, and all the residue by equal portions to and amongst the children, and their representatives if any of such children be dead, exclusive of children who shall have any estate by the settlement of the intestate, or shall be advanced by the intestate in his lifetime by portions equal to the shares allotted to the other children under the distribution. If such advancement should be less than the share of the other children in distribution, then it shall be made equal thereto. But the &quot;heir-at-law, notwithstanding any land that he shall have by descent or otherwise from the intestate, is to have an equal part in distribution with the rest of the children&quot; ( 5). By 6, if there be no children nor any legal representatives of chil.lren, one moiety of til?, estate