It will probably be said, the error is merely one of language; the jurisdiction being clearly legal. Is this true? Can Congress, legally or constitutionally, legislate for American citizens, when undeniably within the jurisdiction of foreign states? Admit this as a principle, and what is to prevent Congress from punishing acts, that it may be the policy of foreign countries to exact from even casual residents. If Congress can punish me, as a pirate, for slaving under a foreign flag, and in foreign countries, it can punish me for carrying arms against all American allies; and yet military service may be exacted of even an American citizen, resident in a foreign state, under particular circumstances. The same difficulty, in principle, may be extended to the whole catalogue of legal crime. Congress exists only for specified purposes. It can _punish_ piracy, but it cannot declare what shall, or shall not, be piracy; as this would be invading the authority of international law. Under the general power to pass laws, that are necessary to carry out the system, it can derive no authority; since there can be no legal necessity for any such double legislation, under the comity of nations. Suppose, for instance, England should legalize slaving, again. Could the United States claim the American citizen, who had engaged in slaving, under the English flag, and from a British port, under the renowned Ashburton treaty? Would England give such a man up? No more than she will now give up the slaves that run from the American vessel, which is driven in by stress of weather. One of the vices of philanthropy is to overreach its own policy, by losing sight of all collateral principles and interests.--Editor. [16]: Ned's pronunciation. [17]: I find, in looking over his papers and accounts, that Ned, exclusively of all the prison-ships, transports, and vessels in which he made passages, has belonged regularly to seventy-two different crafts! In some of these vessels he made many voyages, In the Sterling, he made several passages with the writer; besides four European voyages, at a later day. He made four voyages to Havre in the Erie, which counts as only one vessel, in the above list. He was three voyages to London, in the Washington, &c. &c. &c.; and often made two voyages in the same ship. I am of opinion that Ned's calculation of his having been twenty-five years out of sight of land is very probably true. He must have _sailed, in all ways_, in near a hundred different craft.--Editor. [18]: Pronounced, Wheaton--Editor.