The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-16 00:00:00

There is but one party in England on the sub-
ject of personal slavery. We may hope there is
but one party in Canada also. The popular feeling
is at least as strong there as here ; the meetings
held on the subject of ANDERSON'S committal, and
the memorial to the Home Government suffi-
ciently prove that. If there be any indifference in
a few hearts, or any crotchets in a few minds
through which a fugitive slave would be allowed
to be reclaimed without emotion, or as a ques-
tion of dry law, this is but parallel with what we
have at home in the persons of retired West India
attorneys, or planters, and their immediate connec-
tions, and possibly here and there a legal stoic. The
latter, however, we imagine are very rare. Our law-
yers are not believers in personal bondage. The writ
of habeas corpus is one of their boasts. The decision
therefore of the Queen's Bench yesterday will be
received in every part of England with the same
pleasure which it gave to every individual in court.
Our readers will of course observe that it is not
a legal settlement of the question of ANDERSON'S
extradition. Whether he be legally in custody for
that purpose is the issue to be tried when the brave
fugitive arrives in this country. The only point
decided yesterday was that the Queen's Courts at
Westminster have so far concurrent jurisdiction
with the Courts in Canada that they can order the
production before them of any person detained in
custody, to decide whether or not he is lawfully
deprived of his liberty. The broad principle
contended for was, in the language of the law
books, that " the QUEEN ought to have an
account why any of her subjects are imprisoned."
And it would appear that any of her MAJESTY'S
Courts in Westminster have power to demand this
aceount, and had the Queen's Bench application
failed, it would have been open to Mr. JAMES to
have appealed to tne other Courts in succession.
The precedents appeared to bear all of them in the
same direction, though it must be confessed none
applied directly to Canada in its present circum-
stances of real independence. The Lord Chief
Justice, however, and his brother judges held that
the power to issue a writ of Babeas Corpus to any
part of the QUEEN'S dominions, had existed from
the earliest times, and been exercised to the latest,
and that as it had never been taken away by any
distinct enactment, the Court had no discretion to
refuse the writ.

We are quite aware of the danger of straining
law to meet a popular demand; but our judges feel
this even more strongly than we do, and we may
be assured that had they not clearly seen that
analogy was not strongly in favour of the demand
they would not for a moment have hearkened Ito it.
They would have left the wrong to find a remedy
by diplomacy or other means, rather than have
granted redress illegally. What seemed to weigh
most with the Lord Chief Justice was the danger
of trenching on Canadian indepenndence, a feeling
we must honour, as much as solicitude for the liberty
of poor ANDERSON. It strikes us, however, that
this will be a good case on which to raise the
question whether the QUEEN'S Courts shall retain
the power or not. It is obvious, as we have already
remarked, that the object of the writ is popular now
in Canada. It will attain an end which all there
desire should now be attained. It cannot well,
therefore create any in Canada as being an
aot hostile to the sentiments of the Canadian people.
It is not the levying of a duty or the imposition of
a tax which they have united to resist— it is the
exercise of a little-used power to redress a wrong
at which all Toronto is indignant. At the worst it
only bears some resemblance to the interference of
the Lords last year, when the Commons had
wronged the exchequer by repealing a tax it
could not spare. The Lords had the power to
forbid its repeal, and they used it, though under
notice that the thing must not be repeated. In the
same way, as the Canadians in all they have
received or asked, have never had independence of
of this mode of action of the QUEEN'S courts con-
ferred on them, they will accept it now, when used
for an object in accordance with their wishes; and,
if they do not wish the power to remain, if they
think it capable of abuse, it will be for them to ask
its abrogation by an explicit act of Parliament.
At first sight, it certainly appears to us that our
lovers of liberty in the colonies, while they remain
in connection with the British Crown, will be slow
to wish for the abrogation of any power, local er
imperial, which has for its object the personal
liberty of the subject.
In any case, ANDERSON is perfectly safe. The
surrender under the Extradition Act must have
been through the Governor, and it cannot be con-
ceived that our Government would have permitted
that of. Canada to deliver up the fugitive. The
appeal also to the higher court in Canada might be
successful ; it might hold that the appeal would
lie, and that the man was unlawfully in custody.
But in this country there can be no doubt what the
judgment would be. Our judges would, we ima-
gine, be unanimous as to the meaning of the treaty.
They would not in this be biassed by their English
predilections ; but, the more we reflect on the more
we feel satisfied that the two Canadian judges
misapplied the treaty, and quite unintentionally,
foisted into it a crime which the English author
of the treaty would assuredly have rather held to
be a virtue—the crime of killing a man who
attempted to kidnap you. The wonder with every-
one seems to be how the words of the treaty could
have been applied as they were. The statement is,
so far, as clear as it well can be, that the crime of
the man whose extradition is required would not
have been the crime charged on him if committed in
Canada itself, Notoriously it is not so. ANDERSON'S
killing DIGGES in Canada would not only have
been no crime, but rather a duty to himself, his
family, and society. Let kidnappers be stabbed,
says the common law written on the heart of every
British subject in Canada as well as in Middlesex.
Yes, but DIGGES was acting according to the law
of Missouri. So much the worse for DIGGES and
Missouri. If States can become confederations of
kidnappers, that is no reason why other honest
and free States should recognise the kidnappers'
laws as laws of public justice, acting under them
as a justification, and resisting those who so
acted, as a crime. The laws themselves
are the crime. We can know nothing
of them. A treaty between us and the States
respecting criminal offences Can relate only

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THE SUN.
LONDON, WEDNESDAY, MN. 16, 1881.