Gerke

Bryan, J., concurred.

By a convention between the United States and the Kingdom of Prussia, made in the year 1828, the 14th article provides, ‘‘And when on the death of any person holding real estate within the territory of the one party, such real estate would, by the laws of the land, descend on a citizen or subject of the other, were he not disqualified by alien-age, such citizen or subject shall be allowed a reasonable time to sell the same, and to withdraw the proceeds without molestation.”

The Attorney General, in support of the information filed in this case, denies the power of the Federal Government to make such a provision by treaty, and the determination of this case depends upon the solution of that question. Cases have frequently arisen, where aliens have claimed to inherit by virtue of treaty provisions analogous to the one under consideration, and in all of them, so far as I have examined, the stipulations were enforced in favor of the foreign claimants. See 2 Wheat., 259 . 4 Ib., 453. 8 Ib., 464. 9 Ib., 489. 10 Ib., 181.

But in none of these cases was the question raised as to the power of the Federal Government to make the treaty. It has been the practice of…

I neither concur nor dissent from the opinion of the Court, not having heard the argument or examined the questions suEciently to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion.

I agree with my associate, that the doctrine has been settled in the United States Courts, in cases relating to analogous treaties to the one in question, that the Courts of the country should *386 extend to aliens, the full protection which the treaty seeks to give them, in the acquisition or distribution of property.

In Chirac v. Chirac, ( 2 Wheaton, 259 ,) the treaty with France of 1778, was passed upon, and it was decided by the United States Court, that it secured to the citizens and subjects of either Power, the privilege of holding lauds in the territory of the other. This was reaffirmed in Cavneac v. Banks, ( 10 Wheaton, 189 .) A similar provision in the treaty with Great Britain of 1794 was also sanctioned by the Supreme Court of the United States, in Hughes v. Edwards, ( 9 Wheaton, 489 .) So far as the authority of the Federal Courts is concerned, they appear to have uniformly administed the law upon the meaning given by construction to the language of the treaty, seeming never to have, in any respect, doubted the power of the General Government to provide by treaty with a foreign Power for the mutual protection of the property belonging to the citizens or subjects of…