392 WRIGHT— POWER TO MAKE POLITICAL DECISIONS. 



"Is this duty limited to the enforcement of Acts of Congress or of 

 treaties of the United States according to their express terms, or does it 

 include the rights, duties and obligations growing out of the Constitution 

 itself, our international' relations and the protection implied by the nature of 

 the government under the Constitution?" 



The Constitution guarantees the " privileges and immunities of 

 citizens of the United States " and these were held in the Slaughter 

 House cases to include the right to protection abroad. ^^ Conse- 

 quently the President's duty to execute the laws includes a duty to 

 protect citizens abroad and in pursuance of this duty he may utilize 

 his powers as Commander-in-Chief. Thus the court justified the 

 President in authorizing the bombardment of Greytown, Nicaragua, 

 in 1854:^^ 



" As respects the interposition of the Executive abroad, for the protection 

 of the lives or property of the citizen, the duty must, of necessity, rest in 

 the discretion of the President. Acts of lawless violence to the citizen or 

 bis property cannot be anticipated and provided for; and the protection, to 

 be effectual or of any avail, may, not unfrequently, require the most prompt 

 and decided action. Under our system of Government, the citizen abroad is 

 as much entitled to protection as the citizen at home. The great object and 

 duty of Government is the protection of the lives, liberty, and property of 

 the people composing it, whether abroad or at home ; and any Government 

 failing in the accomplishment of the object, or the performance of the duty, 

 is not worth the preserving." 



In the Neagle case the Supreme Court referred to and endorsed 

 executive action in 1853 in protecting Alartin Koszta, a Hungarian 

 revolutionist who had not completed his American naturalization. 

 Captain Ingraham, in command of the American sloop-of-war St. 

 Louis arrived in Smyrna as Koszta was being abducted, " de- 

 manded his surrender to him, and was compelled to train his guns 

 upon the Austrian vessel before his demands were complied with." 

 The court notes that Secretary of State Marcy's defense of this 

 action and insistence upon the liberation of Koszta who had been 

 placed in charge of the French consul at Smyrna "met the ap- 

 proval of the country and Congress, who voted a gold medal to Cap- 

 tain Ingraham for his conduct of the affair." Yet says the court, 



8^ U. S. Constitution, Amendment XIV ; Slaughter House Cases, 16 

 Wall. 36. 



88 Durand v. Hollins, 4 Blatch 451, 454; Corwin, op. cit., p. 144. 



