Continuation of the remarks in relation to the plan for the reform of consular jurisdiction in Egypt, March 31, 1873

Continuation of the remarks in relation to the plan for the reform of consular jurisdiction in Egypt.

It appears from the latest advices received from Constantinople that the omission of the clause relative to personal status in the recent work of Nubar Pasha, concerning the judicial organization, seems purely fortuitous, and that the re-establishment of this stipulation would give rise to no difficulty. However, some confusion may have existed on this subject in the minds of the commission of delegates of the representatives of the powers at Constantinople, and it seems opportune to elucidate the question thoroughly, for the prevention of any misunderstanding in future. The commission has included among the crimes and offenses which are to be considered as committed against the execution of civil or commercial sentences of the new courts, the acts characteristic of fraudulent bankruptcy; this presupposes the existence of a judgment declaring that a failure has taken place. Now, a judicial declaration of failure is an act which affects the personal status; it greatly alters the legal condition, the civil, and even the political capacity of the individual who is its object, and it seems impossible to admit that it can be pronounced against a foreigner by the jurisdiction of the country without infringing upon the essential rights which the powers have always meant to reserve to their consuls. It is, therefore, important very clearly to establish the part that is to be taken by the two courts in cases of bankruptcy, and the guarantees that shall be enjoyed, in virtue of the new organization, by native creditors. Consular justice ought to retain cognizance of the question of personal capacity; Egyptian justice should decide questions relating to the interests in dispute.

Such is, in this complicated matter, the solution which seems the most conformable to the logic of law, and which is most easily reconciled with the respect due to the respective situations. The powers have the greatest interest in causing these principles to prevail, and in including, so that no dispute or doubt may arise on this head, declarations of bankruptcy among the matters reserved, as belonging to personal status, to consular jurisdiction.

There is another matter which claims the solicitude of the powers, and in view of which it would seem good for them to make their reserves before acquiescing in the installation of the new order of things. This refers to the guarantees necessary to secure in Egypt, on the part of the natives, the execution of the sentences pronounced by the new courts. Egyptian residents have the greatest interest in obtaining, in matters of this kind, the positive satisfaction of which they have hitherto been deprived. It is the more urgent to supply this defect, seeing that no precaution has been neglected in order to secure the execution of the new territorial justice as regards Christians. The immunities which rendered their domiciles, and sometimes their persons, inviolable, are subjected to all the restrictions which it was possible to demand; the powers have granted all guarantees, and have advanced, in this path, to the utmost limit of admissible concessions. They will thus have a stronger right to claim similar securities for their citizens.