However, if
he prefers to follow the latter course, his rights remain, because the
rebellion that drove him from his position was inherently unjust.
But the question then emerges as to whether other powers have the
right to form themselves into an alliance in behalf of such a
dethroned monarch merely in order not to leave the crime committed
by the people unavenged, or to do away with it as a scandal to all the
states; and whether they are therefore justified and called upon to
restore by force to another state a formerly existing constitution
that has been removed by a revolution. The discussion of this
question, however, does not belong to this department of public right,
but to the following section, concerning the right of nations.
B. Land Rights. Secular and Church Lands, Rights of Taxation;
Finance; Police; Inspection.
Is the sovereign, viewed as embodying the legislative power, to be
regarded as the supreme proprietor of the soil, or only as the highest
ruler of the people by the laws? As the soil is the supreme
condition under which it is alone possible to have external things
as one's own, its possible possession and use constitute the first
acquirable basis of external right. Hence it is that all such rights
must be derived from the sovereign as overlord and paramount
superior of the soil, or, as it may be better put, as the supreme
proprietor of the land (dominus territorii).
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