ARGUMENT OF MR. ROOT 329 



the United States to make a contract with one who is not an 

 inhabitant. 



The President: If you please, Mr. Senator Root, what was 

 the consequence of this decision? Was the right of one of these 

 companies Hmited by the absence of the right of the other com- 

 pany or was the absence of the right of one of these companies 

 supplemented by the right of the other? 



Senator Root: In the contract the two rights must necessarily 

 ejdst to support the contract. 



The PREsmENT: Yes. 



Senator Root: The right of the company which was acting 

 within its corporate power was full and complete. 



The Preskent : Yes; but could it exercise its right in relation 

 to the other company whose right was defective ? 



Senator Root: No. 



The President: No; it could not. 



Senator Root : Not in relation to the other company, but not 

 through any defect of its right. 



The President : Not through the defect of its right, but through 

 the defect of the right of the other. 



Senator Root: It could not make a contract with the other 

 company any more than it could make a contract with a person 

 under the lawful age of contracting, or anyone not sui juris. The 

 defect, however, was not a defect of the right. No invahdity was 

 imported into the right of the company which was keeping within 

 its corporate powers. 



The practical bearing of this question: It is a mistake to suppose 

 that it relates practically to any prohibition upon the citizens of 

 Newfoundland. There is no such prohibition. It is true that in 

 the recent correspondence Sir Edward Grey made an observation 

 to the effect that he did not suppose that the United States would 

 contend that it had a right to withdraw the citizens of Newfound- 

 land from obedience to their own laws. That was not answered. 



