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CHAPTER XXIV.: PLAN OF THE MARITIME CODE. - Jeremy Bentham, The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 3 [1843]

Edition used:

The Works of Jeremy Bentham, published under the Superintendence of his Executor, John Bowring (Edinburgh: William Tait, 1838-1843). 11 vols. Vol. 3.

Part of: The Works of Jeremy Bentham, 11 vols.

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CHAPTER XXIV.

PLAN OF THE MARITIME CODE.

The Maritime Code has many parts related to the penal code, the civil, the military, and the international codes.

1. Penal.—When robbery is committed upon the sea, or by persons who come by sea to commit it, in certain cases a particular name is given to it—it is piracy. But what is the difference whether these offences have for their theatre the dry land, or land covered with water? And wherefore give them different names?

2. Civil.—The changes which the sea experiences, and which it occasions, give rise to many methods of acquiring and losing. Lands are abandoned by it—islands are discovered in it—shipwrecked goods are thrown up by it: from these result a great number of particular arrangements.

Ships are at once houses and carriages. Large vessels are floating castles. The sea, if we may use an expression so contradictory in appearance, is a species of immoveable always in motion, whose value is in certain situations very considerable, in others null: here it is fruitful, there barren; here it becomes dry, and there it again covers the dry land. Everywhere it is a highway, and a highway that repairs itself. In its furthest distances, it is as a heath which leads to nothing, and brings back nothing.

This is not all: it is too often a field of battle, and by this the maritime code has a part in common with the military code.

We see in an instant the subjects which it offers for the international code. The right of chase—the right of harvest, or, as it is called when speaking of the sea, the right of fishing—cannot belong everywhere to all the world. It follows, then, that upon the sea, as well as upon the dry land, certain properties can be established. But as to the right of passage, it may be common to everybody, without injury to any. It remains to be examined how all these points may be regulated for the common utility.

The maritime code touches the political code, in consequence of the powers granted to naval officers, admirals, captains, &c.

A ship is a little wandering province, like the island of Laputa. Some vessels of war contain more citizens than there are in the republic of Saint Martin.

Hitherto the distinction between maritime and terrestrial law, if we may use the term, has not appeared to rest upon solid foundations. Still it is desirable, because of the particular circumstances in which sailors are placed, that they should have a separate code, distinct laws, for themselves. It is a means of simplifying the general code.

Vessels are liable to injure one another. This is only a particular case of damage, in which there may be, as in every other evil intention, a smaller or greater degree of fault, or pure accident. Particular regulations may be made upon these points, and placed in the maritime code; or in treating of damage in the general penal code, the most common events with reference to ships may be included there.

The police of ports would find its most natural place in this code.