PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION, 369 



it, and as the United States courts have again and again expressed 

 it, that " the public revenues are a portion that each subject gives 

 of his property in order to secure and enjoy the remainder." When, 

 therefore, a State like Massachusetts assesses property situated be- 

 yond its territory and jurisdiction, and which its laws are not com- 

 petent or able to either reach or to protect, or assesses one of its own 

 citizens in respect to such property, the act has no claim to be re- 

 garded as taxation, but is simply arbitrary taking, or confiscation, 

 and a procedure which the United States Supreme Court has, at 

 least in the case under consideration, declared to be unconstitutional, 

 and therefore illegal and unwarranted. But the Supreme Court of 

 the United States has placed itself on record before in respect to the 

 principle that protection and taxation are correlative; and in another 

 case, which appears almost wholly to have escaped the attention of 

 the American bar and public, its decision is invested with a his- 

 torical as well as a legal interest. Thus, in September, 1814, the 

 country being then at war with Great Britain, the town of Castine 

 in Maine was captured by the British, and remained in their exclu- 

 sive possession until after the ratification of peace, in 1815. During 

 this period the British Government exercised all civil and military 

 authority over the place; established a customhouse, and allowed 

 goods to be imported, which goods remained in Castine after it was 

 evacuated by the enemy. After the re-establishment of the Ameri- 

 can Government, however, the United States collector of customs, 

 claiming a right to American duties on the goods in question, de- 

 manded payment of the same from the owners or importers, and, the 

 claim being resisted, the case went up to the Supreme Court, where 

 Judge Story, then upon the bench, gave judgment for the defendants 

 as follows: 



" We are all of the opinion that the claim for duties can not be 

 sustained. By the conquest and military occupation of Castine, the 

 enemy acquired that firm possession which enabled him to exercise 

 the fullest rights of sovereignty over that place. The sovereignty 

 of the United States over the territory was of course suspended, 

 and the laws of the United States could no longer be rightfully en- 

 forced there, or be obligatory upon the inhabitants who remained 

 there and submitted to the conquerors. By the surrender, the in- 

 habitants passed under a temporary allegiance to the British Govern- 

 ment, and were bound by such laws, and such only, as it chose to rec- 

 ognize and impose. From the nature of the case, no other laws 

 could be obligatory on them; for where there is no protection, or 

 allegiance, or sovereignty, there can he no claim to obedience." 



But to return to the subject more immediately under considera- 

 tion. The court having thus affirmed the situs for the taxation of 



VOL. LII. 28 



