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AMERICAN AND BRITISH CLAIMS ARBITRATION.

ROBERT E. BROWN.

Reply of the United States.

The United States after examination of the Answer of His Majesty's Government deems it to be necessary to present certain facts dealing with allegations in the Answer conformably to the intent of Number 17 of the Rules of Procedure of the arbitration. It will be of service in clarifying the issues in this case to quote certain passages from the Answer of His Majesty's Government showing their views as to the contentions which the United States must maintain in order to establish the liability of His Majesty's Government.

On page 2 of the Answer appears the following:

"Throughout the duration of the litigation between Brown and the Transvaal officials, in which this denial of justice is said to have taken place, the South African Republic was a free and independent State, and it is therefore incumbent upon the Government of the United States not merely to establish the obligation of the South African Republic to pay compensation in respect of the injury suffered by Brown, but also to show that that liability has passed to His Majesty's Government. In the absence of such proof the claim must necessarily fall to the ground, whether or not it was valid against the South African Republic."

The Answer refers to the penultimate paragraph on page 11 of the Memorial and comments thereon as follows:

"The Brown claim is stated on p. 1 of the Memorial to be a claim. arising out of a denial of justice suffered by the late Robert E. Brown in the Courts of the late South African Republic, and the wording of the above paragraph from p. 11 seems singularly inapplicable to a claim for compensation arising out of a denial of justice in the Courts. Brown's right to compensation was certainly not a debt of the South African Republic, still less was it a judgment debt. The second sentence of the paragraph seems to be even more irrelevant, for if the legal obligation of the South African Republic flowed from the denial of justice in the Courts it can not have been a 'tortious taking or deprivation of real estate or interests therein.'" (Page 3.)

Some complaint is made in the Answer that the United States did not properly comply with Rule 11 of the Rules of Procedure for the arbitration in stating the grounds upon which the claim is put forward, and with respect to this point it is said:

"No precedents are quoted to show that a conqueror is bound by the rules of international law to undertake such obligations of a conquered state, and His Majesty's Government are left exposed to the risk and inconvenience of a sudden change of ground on the part

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