Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/308

272 HARVARD LAW REVIEW in carrying a cargo of general merchandise belonging to private persons. The vessel was to carry on its return voyage material for the use of the Argentine Republic. In The AUualita ^^ the ship at the time the Ubel was served was on her way under orders of the Italian government to load a cargo of grain and rails for Italy. No question was made of the pubUc use of the vessel although she was refused immunity on other grounds. The most recent case on this subject, The Maipo,^"^ holds immune a Chilean naval transport which the government as the result of public bidding chartered to a private individual for commercial purposes. The court assumed that the foreign government may have retained possession of its ship through its naval captain and crew for the very purpose of keeping the vessel immune in foreign ports. This circumstance was not considered important. The result and effect of holding the vessel immune was treated as the determining factor in the decision. In this connection Judge Mayer said: "These enterprises may, in some instances, be regarded (technically speaking) as commercial, but may, in substance, be of benefit to the people at large. Time is of vital importance to every ship, of whatever nationality, which sails the seas. . . . Whatever loss or inconvenience, if not safeguarded against, might thus result either to our people when dealing with foreign ships or to foreign peoples when dealing with us, is the price which the individual is paying for the ultimate benefit of his country." Cases relating to property of the domestic sovereign are equally conclusive. The ship libeled in Young v. S. S. Scotia ^^ was a ferry-boat in the Canadian government's railway system. The Lord Chancellor treated the property right of the Crown as con- clusive of the court's lack of jurisdiction. In The Florence H}^ Judge Learned Hand recognized the public character of a ship which at the time it was libeled was chartered to the Emergency Fleet Corporation and was engaged in loading a cargo of food for the French government. The arrangement between the Fleet Corporation and the French government was assumed to be "no other than the carriage of freight for hire." ^ 238 Fed. 909 (1916). " 252 Fed. 627 (1918). ^ Supra. « Supra.