Opinion of the Court. If this be so, the application calls upon the court, while negotiations are pending, to decide whether the government is right or wrong, and to review the action of the political departments upon the question, contrary to the settled law in that regard. Foster v. Neilson, 2 Pet. 253; Williams v. Suffolk Ins. Company, 3 Sumner, 270; S. C. on certificate of division, 13 Pet. 415; Luther v. Borden, 7 How. 1; Georgia v. Stanton, 6 Wall. 50; Jones v. United States, 137 U. S. 202; Nabob of Carnatic v. East India Company, 1 Ves. Jr. 371; S. C. 2 Ves. Jr. 56; Barclay v. Russell, 3 Ves. Jr. 424; Penn v. Baltimore, 1 Ves. Sr. 444. In this case, Her Britannic Majesty's Attorney General of Canada has presented, with the knowledge and approval of the Imperial government of Great Britain, a suggestion on behalf of the claimant. He represents no property interest in the vessel, as is sometimes done by consuls, but only a public political interest. We are not insensible to the courtesy implied in the willingness thus manifested that this court should proceed to a decision on the main question argued for the petitioner; nor do we permit ourselves to doubt that under such circumstances the decision would receive all the consideration that the utmost good faith would require; but it is very clear that, presented as a political question merely, it would not fall within our province to determine it. We allude to this in passing, but not at all with the intention of indicating that the suggestion itself diminishes the private rights of the claimant in any degree. We are not to be understood, however, as underrating the weight of the argument that in a case involving private rights, the court may be obliged, if those rights are dependent upon the construction of acts of Congress or of a treaty, and the case turns upon a question, public in its nature, which has not been determined by the political departments in the form of a law specifically settling it, or authorizing the executive to do so, to render judgment, "since we have no more right to decline the jurisdiction which is given than to usurp that which is not given." But we need not go farther in this direction, as our decision Opinion of the Court. rests upon narrower grounds, and we have been led into these observations because, where an application is made to stay the enforcement of a decree three years after its rendition, and after the pendency of an appeal therefrom for the same length of time, (an appeal being allowable, as we shall presently see,) we do not regard the court as constrained to intervene in this way unless, perhaps, upon an irresistible case and adequate reason shown for the delay; and particularly not where such intervention involves the definition of the line of demarcation between coördinate departments of the government and the determination of public questions, action in reference to which is appropriately confided to other departments than the judicial. In what has been said, we have assumed that it appears from the record, properly examinable by us, that the alleged offence was committed more than a marine league from shore; and we now come to consider whether this is the fact. And in doing this, with the view of ascertaining whether the claimant is entitled to be relieved of the payment of $7289.50, which is the amount of the stipulation, the record must be treated as in any other case of private rights. As already seen, prohibition will not go after sentence unless want of jurisdiction appears on the face of the proceedings. But it is contended that the face of the proceedings in a case like the present one embraces the evidence. We think, however, that there is a distinction on principle, and sustained by authority, between what is open on prohibition applied for before sentence and what afterwards. Prohibition stays what is about to be done, but which ought not to be done without it. Before judgment, if the court below persist in going on when it should not, the court above can examine, not simply the process and pleadings technically of record, but the facts in evidence upon which action is being taken. In Ex parte Christy, 3 How. 292, 308, which was an application for a writ of prohibition against the District Court of Louisiana sitting as a court in bankruptcy, Mr. Justice Story said: "So far as respects these allegations of facts, not so found in the proceedings of the District Court, we are not Opinion of the Court. upon the present occasion at liberty to entertain any consideration thereof for the purpose of examination or decision, as it would be an exercise of original jurisdiction on the part of this court not confided to us by law. The application for the prohibition is made upon the ground that the District Court has transcended its jurisdiction in entertaining those proceedings; and whether it has or not must depend, not upon the facts stated dehors the record, but upon those stated in the record upon which the District Court was called to act, and by which alone it could regulate its judgment." And this language was repeated and approved in Ex parte Easton, 95 U. S. 68, where prohibition was asked against a District Court in admiralty. These were cases where the application was before sentence, and they show that the court may consider the evidence as well as the other proceedings in the court sought to be restrained. But after final judgment and the lapse of the term, for the Superior Court to enter upon an examination of the evidence upon a suggested defect in the jurisdiction, that is, a defect not apparent upon the face of the record proper, would be for it to rehear the case and direct the court below not to carry its own judgment into effect, for defect of power to try the particular issue rather than of jurisdiction over the cause. What the court below could not then do, or omit to do, the court above ought not ordinarily to undertake to compel it to do or to omit. In United States v. Peters, 3 Dall. 121, the Cassius, the vessel seized, was under commission by the French government, and was libelled in the District Court of Pennsylvania on account of the seizure of a schooner belonging to libellants upon the high seas, and the libel showed that the schooner had been taken into Port de Paix, (in the dominions of the French Republic,) which justified the presumption that she was carried there for legal adjudication, and it appeared from the suggestion for the prohibition that such was the fact, and that therefore the jurisdiction for the adjudication of the libel was in a French and not in an American admiralty court. That was an application before sentence and the court could look into the evidence before the District Court if necessary, Opinion of the Court. though it appears to us that the want of jurisdiction was evident on the face of the libel; and prohibition was accordingly issued. In Ex parte Phoenix Insurance Co., 118 U. S. 610, 626, it was held that the District Court of the United States in admiralty has no jurisdiction of a petition by the owner of a steam vessel for the trial of the question of his liability for damages caused to buildings on land by fire alleged to have been negligently communicated to them by the vessel through sparks proceeding from her smokestack, and for the limitation of such liability, if existing, under $$ 4283 and 4284, Revised Statutes. And Mr. Justice Blatchford, delivering the opinion of the court, said, after citing Ex parte Easton, 95 U. S. 68, and Ex parte Gordon, 104 U. S. 515: “But in the present case the District Court is called upon by the petition of the owner of the vessel to first determine the question of any liability, when it has no jurisdiction of the cause of action, and then to determine whether the statute covers the case. The case is clearly one for a writ of prohibition, as the want of jurisdiction appears on the face of the proceedings. United States v. Peters, 3 Dall. 121." The cases cited in the text-books, High on Extr. Rem., 606; Shortt on Informations, 442, 448, sustain the general view that the evidence is not to be resorted to after sentence. The principle has no application to courts where the proceedings do not show the matter in any formal way, and such are the decisions in England in reference to county and mayor's courts. United States District Courts sitting in admiralty are courts of superior jurisdiction and every intendment is made in favor of their decrees, so that where it appears that the court has jurisdiction of the subject matter, and that the defendant was duly served with process or voluntarily appeared and made defence, the decree is not open to attack collaterally. Miller v. United States, 11 Wall. 268; McCormick v. Sullivant, 10 Wheat. 192; Des Moines Nav. Company v. Homestead Company, 123 U. S. 552; Cuddy, Petitioner, 131 U. S. 280. By section 750, Revised Statutes, it is provided: "In equity Opinion of the Court. and admiralty causes only the process, pleadings and decree, and such orders and memorandums as may be necessary to show the jurisdiction of the court and regularity of the proceedings, shall be entered upon the final record." Section 698 is as follows: "Upon the appeal of any cause in equity, or of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, or of prize or no prize, a transcript of the record, as directed by law to be made, and copies of the proofs, and of such entries and papers on file as may be necessary on the hearing of the appeal, shall be transmitted to the Supreme Court; Provided, That either the court below or the Supreme Court may order any original document or other evidence to be sent up, in addition to the copy of the record, or in lieu of a copy of a part thereof." In this section the distinction is recognized between that which constitutes the final record and that which may be made part of the record for the purposes of appeal. On appeal all questions properly preserved are open to determination, while on prohibition the inquiry is confined to the matter of jurisdiction, so that it seems to follow that, unless under very extraordinary circumstances, the record proper should only be looked into in the latter class of cases. If the record thus made constitutes the face of the proceedings here, the alleged want of jurisdiction does not appear therefrom. The libel alleges that the seizure was made "within the limits of Alaska Territory and in the waters thereof, and within the civil and judicial District of Alaska, to wit, within the waters of that portion of Behring Sea belonging to the United States and said district, on waters navigable from the sea by vessels of ten or more tons burden." As it is admitted that the United States lawfully exercises jurisdiction to the extent of three miles from shore over the waters of Behring Sea, the allegation of seizure within the jurisdiction is sufficient. The libel further avers that the vessel and her captain, officers and crew, "were then and there found engaged in killing fur seals within the limits of Alaska Territory, and in the said waters thereof, in violation of section 1956 of the |