CONFISCATE. To appropriate to the use of the state.
Especially used of the goods and property of alien enemies found in a state in time of war. 1 Kent, 52 et seq. Bona confiscate and foriefacta are said to be the same (1 Blackstone, Comm. 299), and the result to the individual is the same whether the property be forfeited or confiscated; but, as distin guished, an individual forfeits a state, confiscates goods or other property. Used also as an adjec tive, —forfeited. 1 Blackstone, Comm. 299.
2. It is a general rule that the property of the subjects of an enemy found in the country may be appropriated by the government with out notice, unless there be a treaty to the con trary. 1 Gall. C. C. 563; 3 Dall. Penn. 199. It has been frequently provided by treaty that foreign subjects should be permitted to remain and continue their business, notwith standing a rupture between the governments, so long as they conducted themselves inno cently ; and when there was no such treaty, such a liberal permission has been announced in the very declaration of war. Vattel, 1. 3, C. 4, 0 63. Sir Michael Foster (Discourses on High .Treason, pp. 185, 6) mentions several instances of such declarations by the king of Great Britain ; and he says that alien ene mies were thereby enabled to acquire personal chattels and to maintain actions for the re covery of their personal rights in as full a manner as alien friends. 1 Kent, Comm. 57.
3. In the United States, the broad prin ciple has been assumed " that war gives to the sovereign full right to take the persons and confiscate the property of the enemy, wherever found. The mitigations of this
rigid rule which the policy of modern times has introduced into practice will more or less affect the exercise of this right, but cannot impair the right itself." 8 Cranch, 122. Commercial nations have always considerable property in the possession of their neighbors; and when war breaks out, the question what shall be done with enemies' property found in the country is one rather of policy than of law, and is properly addressed to the con sideration of the legislature, and not to courts of law. The strict right of confiscation ex ists in congress ; and without a legislative act authorizing the confiscation of enemies' property, it cannot be condemned. 8 Cranch, 128, 129.
4. The claim of a right to confiscate debts contracted by individuals in time of peace, and which remain due to subjects of the enemy in time of war, rests very much upon the same principles as that concerning the enemy's tangible property found in the country at the commencement of the war. But it is the universal practice to forbear to seize and confiscate debts and credits. 1 Kent, Comm. 64, 65. See 4 Cranch, 415; 6 id. 286; T. U. P. Charlt. Ga. 140; 2 Harr. & J. Md.
101, 112, 286, 471 ; 7 Conn. 428 ; 1 Day, Conn. 4 ; Kirb. Conn. 228, 291 ; 2 Tayl. No. C. 115 ; Cam. & N. No. C. 77, 492.
See, generally, Chitty, Law of Nations, c. 3 ; Marten, Law of Nat. lib. 8, c. 3, s. 9 ; Burlamaqui, Pol. Law, part 4, c. 7 ; Vattel, liv. 3, c. 4, 63.