March 10, 1005.] 



SCIENCE. 



363 



per cent., which was the duty imposed in 

 the first inheritance tax law of Rome— the 

 vicesima hereditatum et legatorum decreed 

 by Augustus— became not an unusual rate 

 to fix by such an agreement in the latter 

 half of the eighteenth century.* 



So far as concerns such a tax on for- 

 eigners who come to take away what forms 

 part of the wealth of a nation, it is, if the 

 rate be moderate, in no sense inequitable. 

 But for one sovereign to tax what belongs 

 to the wealth of another bears a different 

 aspect. It is the droit d'auhaine in a new 

 dress and a politer form. It even asserts 

 itself over a larger field. 



The ancient dfoit d'auhaine was exerted 

 almost exclusively in the case of foreigners 

 dying within the realm ; never except over 

 tangible property found within it, belong- 

 ing to their estates. The modern droit 

 d'auhaine fastens upon all their property 

 so found, whether tangible or intangible, 

 and this whether they died within the 

 realm or in their own country, out of 

 which, perhaps, they had never set foot. 



In the first of the treaties of the United 

 States with foreign powers their right to 

 do even this, with respect to estate left 

 within their jurisdiction by an American 

 citizen, was excluded, provided a reciprocal 

 exemption were assured in return. This 

 was that negotiated with France in 1778 

 (and abrogated by Congress in 1798), Art. 

 XI. of which read thus : 



The subjects and inhabitants of the said United 

 States, or any one of them, shall not be reputed 

 aubains in France, and consequently shall be ex- 

 empted from the droit d'auhaine, or other similar 

 duty, under what name soever. They may by 

 testament, donation, or otherwise, dispose of their 

 goods, moveable and immovable, in favour of 

 such persons as to them shall seem good, and their 

 heirs, subjects of the said United States, residing 

 whether in France or elsewhere, may succeed them 

 ab intestat, without being obliged to obtain letters 

 of naturalization, and without having the effect 



* See Merlin, ' Repertoire de Jurisprudence,' 

 Detraction. 



of this concession contested or impeded under 

 pretext of any rights or prerogative of provinces, 

 cities, or private persons; and the said heirs, 

 whether such by particular title, or ab intestat 

 shall be exempt from all duty called droit de 

 detraction or other duty of the same king, saving 

 nevertheless the local rights or duties as much 

 and as long as similar ones are not established 

 by the United States, or any of them. The sub- 

 jects of the Most Christian King shall enjoy on 

 their part, in all the dominions of the said 

 States, an entire and perfect reciprocity relative 

 to the stipulations contained in the present arti- 

 cle but it is at the same time agreed that its 

 contents shall not affect the laws made, or that 

 may be made hereafter in France against emigra- 

 tions, which shall remain in all their force and 

 vigour, and the United States on their part, or 

 any of them, shall be at liberty to enact such laws 

 relative to that matter as to them shall seem 

 proper. * 



Among our later treaties with like or 

 broader provisions may be mentioned those 

 with Sweden of 1783, with Wiirtemberg of 

 1844, with Saxony of 1845, f with France 

 of 1853, with Germany of 1876 and with 

 Great Britain of 1900. The exemptions 

 secured by those of the older type related 

 only to property left in or subject to the 

 control of one country by citizens of the 

 other, at the time of their decease. They 

 did not extend to interests of citizens of 

 one in succession to estates of citizens of 

 the other, which are in course of admin- 

 istration in the courts of the latter. J The 

 later conventions do extend to these. § 



The provision in the Constitution of the 

 United States, securing to citizens of one 

 state the ordinary privileges common to 

 citizens of any other into which they may 

 go, gives to our people a somewhat similar 

 measure of security. But it has not pre- 

 vented the building up, slowly at first, 

 rapidly of late, of a network of state tax- 



* 2 U. S. Rev. Stat., 206. 

 t/6td., 723, 809, 690. 



\ Frederickson v. Louisiana, 23 Howard's Re- 

 ports, 445. 



?i Geofroy v. Riggs, 133 United States Reports, 

 2.58. 



