ARTICLE X.—THE DIPLOMATIC AND CONSULAR AGENTS OF FOREIGN NATIONS

 

§458.  It shall be incumbent upon all foreign consuls-general, consuls, vice-consuls, and consular agents, to present their commissions through the diplomatic agents of their several nations, if such exist, and if not, direct to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who, if they are found to be regular, shall, unless otherwise directed by the King, give them exequaturs under the seal of his department; and it shall be the duty of said minister to cause all such exequaturs to be published in the Government Gazette.

 

§459.  No foreign consul, or consular or commercial agent shall be authorized to act as such, or entitled to recover his fees and perquisites in the courts of this Kingdom, until he shall have received his exequatur.

 

§460.  It shall be incumbent upon every diplomatic agent, coming accredited to the King, to notify the Minister of Foreign Affairs of his arrival, and to request an audience of the King, for the purpose of presenting his credentials.  Said minister, upon receipt of such notice, with copy of his credentials, shall take His Majesty’s orders in regard thereto, and communicate the same to such agent.

 

§461.  After any such foreign diplomatic agent shall have presented his credentials to, and been received by the king, it shall be the duty of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, to announce that fact to the public, by notification in the Government Gazette.

 

§462.  No person shall arrest, or otherwise molest, any foreign public minister, received and acknowledged as such by the King, or any attaché, or servant of such minister, except for acts of political sedition, and machinations endangering the political safety of the King’s Government: provided, nevertheless, that no subject or inhabitant of the Kingdom, who shall have contracted debts prior to his entering into the service of any such public minister, which debt shall still be due and unpaid, shall have, take, or receive any benefit of this law; nor shall any person be proceeded against by virtue of this law, for having arrested or sued any domestic servant of such public minister, unless the name of such servant shall have been previously furnished to the department of Foreign Affairs.

 

§463.  It shall be the duty of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, upon the receipt of a list of the attaches, and domestic servants of any such public minister, to cause the same to be published in the Government Gazette, and to furnish a copy of such list to the Marshal.

 

§464.  Foreign public ministers are not amenable to the civil or criminal jurisdiction of the Kingdom, and therefore all writs or process, whereby the person of any public minister, received as such by the King, shall be arrested, or imprisoned, or his property distrained, seized, or attached, shall be utterly null and void, to all intents and purposes whatsoever: provided, always, that force may be applied to confine, or send away any such minister, when the safety of the State, which is superior to all other considerations, absolutely requires it, arising either from the violence of his conduct, or the influence and danger or his machinations.

 

§465.  All writs and process, for the arrest or imprisonment of any attache of a public minister, whose name has been furnished to the Department of Foreign Affairs, as provided in section 462, or for the seizure or attachment of his property, shall be null and void; subject, however, to the provisions of section 462: and provided, always, that he shall enjoy no greater privileges than are accorded to him by the law of nations.

 

§466.  If any person assault, strike, wound, imprison, or in any other manner infract the law of nations, by offering violence to the person of a public minister, such person so offending, on conviction, shall be imprisoned not exceeding five years, and fined at the discretion of the Court; and, if an officer of this Government, shall be liable to removal from office.

 

§467.  All foreign diplomatic agents, received and acknowledged as such by the King, as having the representative character, in a political sense, shall enjoy the exemption from duties upon stores and supplies imported for their private use and consumption, allowed by their respective nations to foreign diplomatic agents of the same rank, and accredited in the same manner; provided that each foreign diplomatic agent shall, previously, adduce to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, satisfactory proof that the exemption claimed by him would be allowed by his own nation to a Hawaiian agent of the same rank, under the like circumstances.

 

 

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