PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. SINCE the First Edition of this work was published the law of Great Britain with regard to Extradition has been greatly altered, and several new Conventions have been made with foreign States. That edition was received with great favour both in this country and in the United States, and was long ago exhausted. In the task of revising the work and adapting it to the present state of the law, I have been much hindered by other engagements, and the delays, for which I alone am responsible, have severely taxed the patience of my publishers. I have, however, spared no pains to make the present volume what I hope and believe my legal brethren will find it— a complete and trustworthy exposition of the law of Great Britain, Canada, France, and the United States upon a subject of great and of increasing importance. EDWARD CLARKE. 3 GARDEN COURT, TEMPLE, July 1874. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. THE Law of Extradition has, until very recently, attracted little attention in England. Various circumstances have of late brought it into frequent public discussion, and it seems advisable that the information upon the subject should be gathered into a convenient form. Several cases, three of them of great importance, have lately been decided in the English Courts; and during a Parliamentary discussion which took place a few months ago, Lord Stanley assured the House of Commons that an opportunity would be afforded next Session for a full and deliberate consideration of the whole subject. The only English book expressly devoted to it is a small pamphlet, published, twenty years ago, by Mr. Charles Egan. This pamphlet, written soon after the treaties with the United States and France were concluded, never pretended to be in any sense a text-book, and has long ceased to be of practical utility. Some valuable remarks upon the question were contained in a pamphlet published by the late Sir George Cornewall Lewis in 1859, but he referred almost exclusively to the theory of the subject. No attempt has hitherto been made to collect and compare the cases decided in England and the countries with which in this matter she is most closely connected. Having been engaged in the three most recent cases in England, I have given a good deal of study to the subject, and I venture to hope that the results of that study, extended for the sake of completeness to the laws of America and France, may not only be useful to the members of my own profession, but may help the public to understand, and the Legislature satisfactorily to deal with, a question which becomes every year of more importance to the world. 3 PUMP COURT, TEMPLE, December 1st, 1866. EDWARD CLARKE. |