Directory_and_Chronicle_1870 — Page 516

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UNITED STATES CONSULAR REGULATIONS.

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70.-Surrender. Any American bail may have leave of the Consul to surrender his principal on payment of all costs and expenses.

71.-Prosecutor may be required to give security.-—Any complainant, informant, or prosecutor may be required to give security for all costs of the prosecution, including those of the accused; and every complainant, &c., not a citizen of the United States, shall be so required, unless, in the Consul's opinion, justice will be better promoted otherwise; and when such security is refused the prosecution shall abate.

72.—Honourable acquittal. —When the innocence of the accused, both in law and in intention, is manifest, the Consul shall add to the usual judgment of acquittal, the word "honourable."

73.—Costs.---In such case julgment may be given and execation issued summarily against any informer, complainant, or prosecutor, for the whole costs of the trial, including those of the accused, or for any part of either or both, if the proceeding appears to have been groundless and vexatious, originating in currupt, malicious, or vindictive motives.

74.—Minor offences.-Consuls will ordinarily encourage the settlement of all prosecutions not of a heinous character by the parties aggrieved or concerned.

XIII-OATHS.

75.-Oaths shall be administered in some language that the witness understands. 76.--Not Christians.-A witness not a Christian shall be sworn according to his religious belief.

77.-Atheist.-An avowed atheist shall not be sworn, but may affirn, un lor the pains and penalties of perjury; the credibility of his evidence being for the considera- tion of the Consul.

78.—Affirmation.-A Christian conscientiously scrupulous of an oath, may affirm under the pains and penalties of perjury,

XIV.-DOCKETS, RECORDS, &c.

79.—Civil dock 4.—Each Consul shall keep a regular docket or calendar of all civil actions and proceedings, entering each case separately, numbering consecutively, to the end of his term of office, with the date of filing, the names of the parties in full, their nationality, the nature of the procee ling, the sum or thing claimed, with minute and dates of all orders, decrees, continuances, appeals and proceedings, until final judgment,

80). --Crimin.l.—He shall keep another regular docket for all criminal cases, with sufficient similar memoran la.

81.-Filing papers.-All original papers shall be filed at once and never removed: no person, but an officer of the Consulate or Minister, should be allowed access to them. All papers in each case must be kept together in one inclosure, and numbered as in the docket with the parties' names, the nature of the proceeding, the year of filing the petition, and of final judgment conspicuously marked on the inclosure, and each year's cases kept by themselves in their order.

XV.—LIMITATION OF ACTIONS AND PROSECUTIONS.

82.- Criminal.-Heinous offences not capital, must be prosecuted within six years, minor offences within two.

83.—Civil.—Civil actions based on written promises, contract, or instrument, must be commenced within six years after the cause of action accrues; others within two.

84.-Absence; fraudulent concealment.-In prosecutions for heinous offences not capital, and in civil cases involving more than $500, any absence of respondent or defendant for more than three months at a time from China, shall be added to the limitations; and in civil cases involving more than $100, the period daring which the cause of action may be fraudulently concealed by defendant, shall likewise be added. XVI. GENERAL PROVISIONS.

85.-Trials public.-All trials and proceedings in the United States' Consular Courts in China shall be open and public.

86.—Interpreting and translating.--Papers and testimony in a foreign language shall be translated into English by a sworn interpreter, appointed by the Consul; in civil cases to be paid by petitioner. Oaths and questions shall be translated by the interpreter from the English for any witness who does not understand English.

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