The phrase "due process of law" does not necessarily mean by a judicial proceeding. (McMillan v. Anderson, 95 U. S., 37, 41.) It is not necessary, in every instance, to obtain a forfeiture by a judicial proceeding in order to destroy property illegally used. There are cases where property illegally used may be summarily destroyed. When the property involved is of trifling value and its destruction is necessary to effect the object of a valid law, it is within the power of the legislature to order its summary destruction. (Lawton v. Steele, 152 U. S., 133, 141.) To require a judicial proceeding to condemn a sheet of music or a music book, wrongfully imported and subject to forfeiture, would effectually prevent, in the case under consideration, the execution of the copyright laws. The expense of such a proceeding would largely exceed the value of the music or music books. The return of the music or music books to the foreign seller would afford him an inducement to violate the law again. By the provision under consideration, the Secretary of the Treasury and the Postmaster-General are not only empowered but required to make and enforce such rules and regulations as shall prevent the importation of prohibited articles. To prevent effectually the importation of prohibited music and music books, may require, under certain circumstances, their summary destruction without notice; and if their nature and value demand a notice and hearing before destruction, the rules and regulations to be adopted may be so framed as to provide for the same, and protect the interests of all parties concerned, without preventing or impeding the enforcement of the copyright law by putting the Government to the necessity of resorting in the first instance to the courts. Respectfully, Approved. JOHN K. RICHARDS, JOHN W. GRIGGS. The SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY. ENTRY AND RETURN CERTIFICATES OF CHINESE. The original entry certificates of Chinese merchants and others exempted must be issued by their Government or the government where they last reside. The return certificate of Chinese persons entitled to return to the United States under the contingency contemplated by Article II of the treaty of 1894 with China must be accompanied by a certificate as to the facts, made by the Chinese consul at the port of departure. Certificates issued to Chinese persons of the exempted class by the Chinese consul at Havana in the absence of certification by a consular officer of the United States should not be accepted by the customs officials of the United States. The return entry of such Chinese is allowed only upon strict compliance with the terms of the treaty and the regulations formed thereunder. The terms upon which the representation of the interests of the United States at Havana was committed or entrusted to the British consul during the existing war with Spain were informal and did not specifically include the service of viséing certificates to be issued to Chinese persons. Chinese certificates viséed by the British consul at Havana during the absence of the United States consular officers may be accepted by the authorities of the United States, provided this duty is voluntarily performed by such officer with the consent of the British Government. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, May 6, 1898. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your communication of May 2, relative to certain correspondence passing between the Department of State and the Chinese minister at this capital, copies of which have been transmitted to your Department, in the course of which inquiry was made by the Chinese minister as to whether certain Chinese certificates, viséed by the British consul at Havana Juring the absence from Havana of the consular officers of the United States, would be accepted by the proper authorities of the United States. You inform me, further, that the collector of customs at New York has requested instructions from you as to the acceptance of certificates issued to Chinese persons of the exempt class by the Chinese consul at Havana but without certification by the consular officer of the United States, and whether in case it shall be decided that such certificates should not be accepted, certificates viséed by the British consul at Havana should be regarded as sufficient evidence to entitle the holders to admission to this country, and in view of the above facts and the condition of affairs now existing, you request my opinion as to your authority to direct the acceptance of certificates viséed by the British consul at Havana, to whom, it is understood, the consul-general of the United States turned over all matters affecting American interests prior to his recent departure from that city. The certificates in question here may be, so far as the statement of the facts discloses, the "original entry certificates" of merchants and the other classes of Chinese subjects referred to in section 6 of the act of May 6, 1882 (as amended by the act of July 5, 1884), and in Article III of the convention between the United States and China, proclaimed December 8, 1894; or they may be the "return certificates" of Chinese laborers provided for in Article II of said treaty. The question obviously does not refer to the "residence certificates" required of Chinese laborers and allowed to Chinese persons other than laborers by the act of May 5, 1892 (as amended by the act of November 3, 1893), although such residence or registration certificates are the basis under the Treasury regulations of the return certificates to which certain Chinese laborers, under the treaty of 1894, are entitled. It appears, further, that Chinese merchants formerly engaged in business in this country are not required to take out a return certificate for use upon application for reentrance, but shall establish their former status as merchants here by the testimony of two credible witnesses other than Chinese (sec. 2, act of 1893, supra); and the original entry of Chinese laborers is now absolutely prohibited by the act of 1882, as amended, the act of 1892, and the treaty of 1894, and their return entry is allowed only upon strict. compliance with the terms of the said treaty and the regulations framed thereunder (21 Op., 424). The certificates referred to in your queries may therefore embrace the original entry certificates of merchants and the other exempt classes and the return certificates of laborers under the treaty. Your request does not impose upon me the duty of considering the terms and requirements on which the respective certificates may be granted or accepted by the customs officials under the Chinese exclusion acts, the treaty of 1894, the regulations of the State Department and of your Department, and the rulings and decisions upon the subject, except so far as to state generally that the original entry certificates of merchants and others exempt must be issued by their government or the government where they last resided, and the return certificate of the laborers entitled to return must, in the contingency contemplated by Article II of the treaty of 1894, be accompanied by a certificate as to the facts made by the Chinese consul at the port of departure for return to the United States. Moreover, it may be noted that the laws and regulations require that the customs officials, in making the return certificates based on the registration certificate, shall make a thorough examination of the facts and of the accuracy of the applicant's statements, and that the diplomatic or consular representatives of the United States, before indorsing certificates submitted to them, shall examine into the truth of the statements set forth therein, and if the statements are untrue they shall refuse to indorse the certificate. It is quite clear from the language of section 6 of the act of 1882, as amended-which is to be read in connection with Articles II and III of the treaty of 1894-that the respective certificates embraced in this inquiry should be indorsed or viséed by the diplomatic consular representatives of the United States in the foreign country from which the certificate issues, or at the port or place from which the person named therein is about to depart. I am therefore of the opinion that certificates issued to Chinese persons of the exempt classes by the Chinese consul at Havana, but without certification by a consular officer of the United States, should not be accepted by the customs officials. We thus come to the last question in the case, namely, whether certificates viséed by the British consul at Havana, assuming that all the other requirements of the law have been complied with, should be regarded as sufficient evidence to entitle the holders to admission to this country, and this question will be answered by the answer to the question, To what extent is the British consul at Havana a consular officer of the United States? By the comity existing between friendly nations and under diplomatic practice, governments, at the request of friendly powers, often give to their diplomatic and consular officers authority to take upon themselves, with the consent of the government within whose jurisdiction they reside, the function of representing such powers at places where the latter have no consular officers. The United States has understood this authority to be restricted to the extending of protection to the citizens or subjects of the friendly power and to the granting of the services and good offices of our representatives, with their own consent, to meet what has ordinarily been a fortuitous and temporary exigency of the friendly government. (United States Consular Regulations, 1896, p. 60, par. 174; p. 178, par. 453.) However, an indication of the proper course to be pursued in this matter may be obtained from the laws relating to the verification or certification of invoices. The act of March 1, 1823 (3 Stat., 733), section 2844, Revised Statutes, expressly provides that such certification may be made in the absence of the consul or commercial agent of the United States by the consul of a friendly nation; or if there is no such consul in the country, by two merchants; and although the customs administrative act of June 10, 1890, provides for the authentication of invoices by the consul, vice-consul, or commercial agent of the United States of the proper consular district, it is to observed that section 29 of the latter act, repealing various prior provisions of law on the subject, does not repeal section 2844, although it repeals sections 2843 and 2845. While, therefore, the statutes relating to the granting of certificates to Chinese do not contain provisions similar to those in section 2844, it may be said that those statutes, so far as they authorize the granting of certain consular certificates to Chinese, were passed for the purpose of executing the treaties between the United States and China, and that it seems desirable, so far as consular action in such a matter is necessary, that the acts of British consuls, as the representatives of American interests in the Spanish dominions during the existing war, should, so far |