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EXTRADITION OF MORITZ ORMAI TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY.
RECKONING OF DETENTION PERIOD.

File No. 211.63 Or5/2.

The Ambassador of Austria-Hungary to the Secretary of State.

No. 2427.]

[Translation.]

THE AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN EMBASSY, Washington, October 11, 1910. EXCELLENCY: With your valued note of the 8th instant, serial No. 596,1 your excellency was so good as to send me a warrant for the surrender of Moritz Ormai.

I am informed by my Government that there are reasons to suspect that this man has, in addition to the offenses for which his extradition was requested and granted, committed other crimes that come under the provisions of the extradition treaty. The royal Hungarian ministry of justice is gathering the evidence in the case and, upon the completion of this preliminary work, a request that Ormai's extradition be made to include the said additional crimes will be presented through the embassy.

For the accomplishment of this purpose I beg your excellency most kindly to cause Ormai to be held in custody until the additional request for extradition shall have been presented and the decision of the Federal Government on the subject shall have been rendered and followed by Ormai's surrender.

Looking forward to the earliest possible obliging reply on the subject, I beg leave to add that I have explained to my Government the necessity of its making its instructions in the case known as soon as possible.

Accept, etc.,

File No. 211.630r5/2.

(For the imperial and royal ambassador),

LOWENTHAL,

Imperial and Royal Counselor of Legation.

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador of Austria-Hungary. No. 602.]

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, October 18, 1910. EXCELLENCY: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the embassy's note of October 11, which requests that Moritz Ormai, for whose extradition on the charge of forgery a warrant was issued on the 8th instant, be held in custody, for the reason that the AustroHungarian Government suspects that Ormai is guilty of other crimes and is gathering the necessary evidence upon which to base a request for his extradition for such further offenses.

In seeking Ormai's extradition for the further charges, the same procedure should be followed that was adopted in the original proceedings. Some one acting in behalf of the Austro-Hungarian Government should make complaint on oath before the extradition magistrate, whereupon a warrant will be issued covering the additional

1 Not printed.

charges, and the evidence of criminality may be presented and considered.

Under our law a period of two calendar months from the date upon which the accused was committed by the magistrate for extradition is allowed to convey him out of the United States. As he was committed on September 28, this will afford ample time for the institution of further proceedings.

Accept, etc.

P. C. KNOX.

File No. 211.63 Or5/3.

The Ambassador of Austria-Hungary to the Secretary of State.

No. 2497.]

[Translation.]

AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN EMBASSY,
Washington, October 21, 1910.

YOUR EXCELLENCY: Referring to the esteemed note No. 602 of the 18th instant, I have the honor to inform your excellency that my Government has given up extending the request for extradition of Moritz Ormai to other crimes and that said person was embarked yesterday.

The question of keeping him longer under arrest has therefore been solved, and I should like to take the liberty of merely referring to a statement in your excellency's note which might be of fundamental importance in future cases. As stated by your excellency in note No. 2331 of October 3 instant, the arrest of Ormai took place at (toward) the end of August (the exact date is the 22d of that month); the proceedings before the United States commissioner regarding his extradition were terminated on September 28.

In your note your excellency stated this day as "the date upon. which the accused was committed," and on which the two-month period within which the party should be extradited began. I should be much obliged to your excellency for a kind statement whether this is a mistake (which would be easily explainable) or whether the two-month period just mentioned is actually to be calculated from the day on which the proceedings before the United States commissioner are terminated instead of from the day of arrest.

Please accept, etc.,

(In representation of the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador),

File No. 211.630r5/3.

LÖWENTHAL, Counsellor of Legation.

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador of Austria-Hungary. No. 606.] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, October 26, 1910. EXCELLENCY: Replying to the embassy's note of October 21 concerning the extradition of Moritz Ormai, and referring to the general subject of extradition, I have the honor to inform you that the statement made in the department's note of the 18th instant is correct,

the two-months' period within which the accused, in an extradition proceeding, must be conveyed out of the country, being reckoned from the day on which he is committed for extradition by the magistrate. The language of our statute (R. S., 5273) is as follows:

Whenever any person who is committed under this title or any treaty, to remain until delivered up in pursuance of a requisition, is not so delivered up and conveyed out of the United States within two calendar months after such commitment, over and above the time actually required to convey the prisoner from the jail to which he was committed, by the readiest way, out of the United States, it shall be lawful for any judge of the United States, or of any State, upon application made to him by or on behalf of the person so committed, and upon proof made to him that reasonable notice of the intention to make such application has been given to the Secretary of State, to order the person so committed to be discharged out of the custody, unless sufficient cause is shown to such judge why such discharge ought not to be ordered.

Accept, etc.,

(For Mr. Knox), ALVEY A. ADEE.

BELGIUM.

RIGHT OF AGRICULTURAL CORPORATION TO PURCHASE AND HOLD LAND IN THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS.

File No. 811B.5034.

The Acting Secretary of State to the Belgian Minister.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,
Washington, May 2, 1910.

SIR: I beg to transmit herewith, for your information, a copy of an opinion rendered by the Attorney General, dated April 29, 1910, upon the question presented by Mr. Ed. C. André, through you, as to the legal right of a Belgian corporation to purchase and hold a plantation in the Philippine Islands containing an area of 1,430 hectares. As will be observed, the Attorney General holds that under the law no foreign or domestic corporation authorized to engage in agriculture may purchase or hold lands in the Philippines in excess of 1,024 hectares.

Accept, etc.,

[Inclosure.]

HUNTINGTON WILSON.

The Attorney General to the Secretary of State.

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE,
Washington, April 29, 1910.

SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your communication o April 21, instant, in which you state:

I have the honor to inclose copies of two notes addressed, respectively, to the minister of foreign affairs at Brussels by Mr. Ed. C. André, dated April 4, and to the Belgian minister at this capital by the minister of foreign affairs of his Government, dated April 17, and with them three letters from Mr. André, dated March 30 and April 4, addressed to you and handed to me by the minister of Belgium for delivery to you. These documents raise the question whether a Belgian corporation authorized to engage in agriculture may legally purchase and hold a plantation in the Philippine Islands containing an area of 1,430 hectares. The collateral inquiry is also presented whether, if the answer to the foregoing question is in the negative, an agricultural and commercial corporation created under Philippine law may take and hold the said plantation.

You request an expression of my opinion on both of these questions.

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The act of Congress entitled "An act temporarily to provide for the administration of the affairs of civil government in the Philippine Islands, and for other purposes,' approved July 1, 1892, is the law still in force.

By the seventy-fifth section of that act it is provided:

That no corporation shall be authorized to conduct the business of buying and selling real estate or be permitted to hold or own real estate except such as may be reasonably necessary to enable it to carry out the purposes for which it is created, and every corporation authorized to engage in agriculture shall by its charter be restricted to the ownership and control of not to exceed one thousand and twenty-four hectares of land. ** *

The first clause of this section forbids the organization of corporations to conduct the business of buying and selling real estate. The next, recognizing the necessity of some corporations to hold real estate for the conduct of their business, denies the permission to hold or own any real estate except such as may be reasonably necessary to enable it to carry out the purposes for which the corporation is created. The holding of real estate, under this provision, is incidental to the main business of the corporation, such as manufacturing or trading. By no intentment can this apply to a corporation formed for the use or cultivation of land.

By the next clause of this section it is provided:

Every corporation authorized to engage in agriculture shall by its charter be restricted to the ownership and control of not to exceed one thousand and twenty-four hectares of land.

Mr. André suggests, in one of the notes transmitted through you: "I am in doubt whether this refers to the rules and by-laws of the corporation or to the privilege granted to a company at being filed."

This provision is not directory. It affects the very being of the corporation. It is an absolute prohibition of the power to hold land in excess of 1,024 hectares. This limitation was placed on the act after much debate and deliberation in the United States Congress, and it is repeated and emphasized in all the legislation upon this subject.

These prohibitions in the organic act were embraced in the "cor ration law" of the Philippine Commission, enacted by authority of the United S ́

section 13, it is enacted:

By Article I,

Every corporation has power (par. 5) to purchase, hold, convey, sell, lease, let, mortgage, encumber, and otherwise deal with such real and personal property as the purposes for which the corporation was formed may permit and the transaction of the lawful business of the corporation may reasonably and necessarily require, unless otherwise prescribed in this act: Provided, That no corporation shall be authorized to conduct the business of buying and selling real estate or be permitted to hold or own real estate except such as may be reasonably necessary to enable it to carry out the purposes for which it is created, and every corporation authorized to engage in agriculture shall be restricted to the ownership and control of not to exceed one thousand and twenty-four hectares of land.

Reversing the order in which the questions in your communication are presented to me, and replying to the second inquiry, I think an agricultural corporation created under Philippine law can not take and hold of the plantation described, or of any other lands, more than 1,024 hectares.

By the last paragraph of this same section 75 of the act of Congress it is provided: Corporations not organized in the Philippine Islands, and doing business therein, shall be bound by the provisions of this section so far as they are applicable.

And by section 73 of the "corporation law" of the Philippine Commission it is enacted:

Any foreign corporation or corporation not formed, organized, or existing under the laws of the Philippine Islands and law fully doing business in the islands shall be bound by the laws, rules, and regulations applica ble to domestic corporations of the same class, save and except such only as provide for the creation, formation, organization, or dissolution of corporations or such as fix the relations, liabilities, responsibilities, or duties of members, stockholders, or officers of corporations to each other or to the corporation: Provided, however, That nothing in this section contained shall be construed or deemed to impair any rights that are secured or protected by the treaty of peace between the United States and Spain, signed at the city of Paris on December tenth, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight.

This act was passed under the authority delegated by the organic act. Its provisions are declaratory of the limitations of that act.

The restrictions upon the ownership and control of lands in the Philippine Islands by corporations are absolutely determined by this legislation. It is beyond power of the executive branches of the Governments, either of the United

the Philippine Islands, to authorize or permit corporations to own or hold lands in excess of the amount so designated.

corpon 1,024

I am therefore of opinion that neither a corporation formed in Belgium to ac uire and possess lands in the Philippine Islands nor any other foreign or domest ration authorized to engage in agriculture may legally purchase or hold more hectares of land in the Philippine Islands.

I have, etc.,

GEO. W. WICK

TRANSIT OF FUGITIVE FROM JUSTICE IN COURSE OF EXTRADITION PROCEEDINGS BETWEEN LUXEMBURG AND THE UNITED STATES.

File No. 23700/7.

Minister Beaupré to the Secretary of State.

[Telegram.-Paraphrase.

AMERICAN LEGATION,
The Hague, March 31, 1910.

Mr. Beaupré says he is notified by the Luxemburg Government of the arrest made in compliance with the telegraphic request of Wood, detective captain, of Chicago, at Luxemburg on March 24 of Nicholas Knepper on charge of larceny. Asks if extradition papers are being sent to the legation.

67942°- -FR 1910- -6

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