de Vattel: Of the Dignity and Equality of Nations; of Titles and Other Marks of Honor

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* NOW - Buy this resource online! Click here * Of the Dignity and Equality of Nations — of Titles and Other Marks of Honor§ 35. Dignity of nations or sovereign states.§ 36. Their equality.§ 37. Precedency.§ 38. The form of government is foreign to this question.§ 39. A state ought to keep its rank, notwithstanding any changes in the form of its government.§ 40. Treaties and established customs are to be observed in that respect.§ 41. Of the name and honors.§ 42. Whether a sovereign may assume what title and honors he pleases.§ 43. Right of other nations in this respect.§ 45. How titles and honors may be secured.§ 46. We must conform to general customs.§ 47. Mutual respect which sovereigns owe to each other.§ 48. How a sovereign ought to maintain his dignity.
   1. Bartolus went so far as to say, that "all those were heretics who did not believe that the emperor was lord of the whole earth." See Bodinus's Republic, book i. ch. ix. p.m. 139.
   2. History of France, explanation of the medals of Charles V.
   3. In his Republic, p. 138.
   4. Pentherrieder, minister plenipotentiary of the emperor at the congress of Cambray, made an attempt to insure to his master an incontestable superiority and pre-eminence over all the other crowned heads. He induced Count Provana, the king of Sardinia's minister, to sign a deed, in which he declared that neither his own sovereign nor any other prince had a right to dispute pre-eminence with the emperor, its contents being made public, the kings made such heavy complaints on the occasion, that Provana was recalled, and the emperor ordered his minister to suppress the deed, — affecting, at the same time, a profound ignorance of the whole transaction: and thus the affair was dropped. Memoirs of Mons. de St. Philippe, vol. iv. p. 194.
   5. Memoirs of the House of Brandenburg.
   6. Cromwell, in writing to Louis the Fourteenth, used the following style; — "Olivarius, Dominus Protector Angliæ, Scotiæ, et Hiberniæ, Ludovico XIV. Francorum Regi Christianissime Rex." — And the subscription was — "In Aula nostra Alba. Vester bonus amicus." The court of France was highly offended at this form of address. The ambassador Boreel, in a letter to the Pensionary De Witt, dated May 25, 1655, said that Cromwell's letter had not been presented, and that those who were charged with the delivery of it, had withheld it, through an apprehension of its giving rise to some misunderstanding between the two countries.
   7. At the famous treaty of Westphalia, the plenipotentiaries of France agreed with those of the emperor, "that the king and queen writing with their own hand to the emperor, and giving him the title of majesty, he should answer them, with his own hand, and give them the same title." Letter of the plenipotentiaries to M. de Brienne, Oct. 15th, 1646.
   8. Catholic princes receive still from the pope titles that relate to religion, Benedict XIV. gave that of "Most Faithful" to the king of Portugal, and the condescension of other princes connived at the imperative style in which the bull is couched. — It is dated December 23, 1748.