Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1911-01-31
AMBASSADORS PRIVILEGE.
Person of Self and Servants Above All
the Laws

the Laws.
While today in every civilized coun-
try the person Of a foreign ambassador
Is held to be inviolaple, the law Of the
land being powerless to touch him for
any offence, in days gone by, before
his immunity became so perfect he fire.
quently found himself in hot water.
In Elizaberhs time the Spanish am
bassador, Mendoza, was proved to have
taken part in a conspiracy which had
for it's object the dethronement Of the
queen, and he was at once arrested and
kept in prison. High legal opinions
were taken upon the validity of this
them the ambassador was liberated,
but forthwith sent out of the country.
Count Gyllenborg, the Swedish am
bassador to England, in 1717 was ar
rested for having been concerned in a
plot against the Hanoverian dynasty,
and besides this the British govern
ment went to the extreme of seizing
his private papers at the embassy
cuse given for this action was that it
was necessary to the peace Of the state.
Through the mediation of foreign pow
ers, which professed to be very shock
ed at what had taken place, he was
released.
Immunity from arrest extends also
to an ambassadors servants and the
members of his suite. There is, how
ever, one case on record in which an
ambassadors assistant was really exc
cuted, and that was in great Britain.
This was in 1853, and the victim was
Pantaleon Sa, who was the brother
and one of the train Of the Portuguese
ambassador. He quarreled with an ac-
quaintance over a business matter and
wounded him. the life of the party at
tackled being saved only by the inter-
vention of bystanders. But the next
night Pantaleon Sa with fifty Of his
Portuguese friends, all armed to the
teeth, sought out his enemy with the
intention Of killing him. There was a
desperate struggle, and one person was
killed and several were wounded. The
! guards were called in, but the Portu-
| guese fired on them also. Then Pan
| taleon Sa sought refuge in his embas-
sy where he thought he was safe; but
the ambassador surrendered him, and
he was duly executed, after some hes
| ,t oft ha ,,th
| The most extraordinary example OF
ambassadorial privilege on record oc-
Cured in 1861, when the French and
Spanish ambassadors at London and
their retinues fought a fierce battle in
the streets of e 1T capital, twelve per-
sons being killed and forty wounded.
On this occasion a new Swedish am
bassador was coming to London, and
there was a dispute between the
French and Spanish ambassadors as
to who should have precedence in the
procession of welcome. When at last
the Swedish diplomatist arrived, and
was proceeding from Tower Hill to
Whitehall. the Spaniards, who had a
force of a hundred men on foot and
fifty on horseback, formed across the
road to bar the passage Of the French.
The latter fired a volley and charged
the Spanish, sword in hand. Three
horses, the position and the coachman
of the French ambassador were killed
at the outset; but the struggle lasted
| for a long time after that. In the end
victory was with the Spanish. Nobody
was punished. Nor could anybody be
punished if such an event should hap
pen anywhere today.-Harper's Week.
| ",