Cases Involving Diplomatic Officers

                The topic of discussion for this Constitution Monday comes from Article III, Section 2, and Clause 2:  “In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls …, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction….”

                “Because of the delicate relationships with foreign powers, this provision gives any top diplomatic officer the RIGHT to have immediate access to the highest tribunal in the land in order to settle any legal problem.

                “The traditional protocol between nations has always allowed a diplomat representing the ruler or leaders of a sovereign nation to deal with the top leaders of the host nation.  The same principle applies where an ambassador or minister of a foreign country has become entangled in some legal problem which might affect the relationship between the United States and the country he represents.  Alexander Hamilton gave the following explanation:

                “`Public ministers of every class are the immediate representatives of their sovereigns.  All questions in which they are concerned are so directly connected with the public peace, that, as well for the preservation of this as out of respect to the sovereignties they represent, it is both expedient and proper that such questions should be submitted in the first instance to the highest judicatory of the nation.  Though consuls have not in strictness a diplomatic character, yet, as they are the public agents of the nations to which they belong, the same observation is in a great measure applicable to them” (As quoted by W. Cleon Skousen in The Making of America – The Substance and Meaning of the Constitution, p. 607).