CORBIE'S CASE.—2 BLAND. 475

world, regardless of the pernicious bearing of such a proceeding
upon the interests of the foreign creditors of such bankrupt or
insolvent debtor; upon the ground, that personal property must
be governed by the law of the owner's domicil. Sill v. Worswick,
1 H. Black. 665; Philips v. Hunter, 3 H. Blac. 402; Hunter v. Potts,
4 T. R. 183. And yet it is held by them, that the discharge of a
debtor, under the bankrupt or insolvent laws of one country, can-
not impair the obligation of contracts made in another, or dis-
charge such debtor from any liability to the claims of his foreign
creditors contracted any where else. Smith v. Buchanan, 1 East,
6; Lewis v. Owen, 6 Com. Law Rep. 555; Phillips v. Alien, 15 Com.
Laic Rep. 269; M'Kim v. Marshall, 1 H. & J. 101; Frey v. Kirk,
4 G. & J. 510.

But the weight of Americau judicial authority, is adverse to
such an unfair course of proceeding, and accords in principle with
the before mentioned legislative enactments of Maryland, by which
the interests of the State sown citizens are to be first and specially
regarded; and for that purpose, our law refuses to allow the 497
* proceedings under the bankrupt or insolvent laws of a

foreign State, to give any right, or to affect the title to any prop-
erty belonging to the debtor and found within this State, in any
way whatever. Holme v. Remsen, 20 John. Rep. 229; Milne v.
Moreton, 6 Binney, 353; Burk v. McClain,, 1 H. & McH. 236; Wal-
lace v. Patterson, 2 H. & McH. 463; Harrison v. Sterry, 5 Cran. 289;
Or/den v. Saunders, 12 Wheat. 213; Brickwood v. Miller, 3 Merix.
280; Kames' Pri. Eg. b. 3, c. 8, .s. 6.

The law in relation to the. administration of a deceased foreign
debtor's effects found here, is now settled upon the same general
principles, that of a duty which the State owes to its own
citizens.

According to the ancient common law of England, upon the
death of any one intestate his personal estate devolved upon the
Kine, whose duty it was. as sovereign, and as parens patriae, to
take care of, and have justice done to all his subjects; and there-
fore, he caused the effects of the deceased to be placed in the
hands of some fit person, to be administered for the benefit of his
creditors and next of kin. After which, this public duty of the
sovereign was delegated by him to the clergy; who under the pre-
text of applying such estates to pious uses, upon the ground, that
there was a general principle of piety in the testator, Moggridye v.
Thackwell, 7 Fes. 69, fraudulently appropriated the whole to their
own aggrandizement, leaving the creditors of the deceased unpaid,
and his next of kin destitute. To prevent these fraudulent
Practices of the clergy of those times, the Parliament interposed
and passed laws, in affirmance of the ancient common law, re-
quiring the bishops to appoint administrators, in whose hands the
personal estate of intestates, should be placed, to be administered