Martin Galea Testaferrata Moroni Viani (The Sunday Times, October 17) expressed his opinion regarding the legal title of the French occupation of Malta on which I had written in this newspaper on October 3.
He disagreed with the judgment of the Court of Appeal I had quoted, held that the Civil Acts of the French government of Malta were valid, and that all of the Order’s erstwhile assets had become British by right of conquest, as Mario Farrugia had said.
In my letter of October 3 I had not brought forward a single legal argument of my own to disagree with Mr Farrugia. I merely said that Mr Farrugia’s basic contention had been proven wrong by a court of law.
I rested solely on the dictum laid down in 1885 by three judges, namely, Chief Justice Sir Adrian Dingli, Judge Lorenzo Xuereb and Judge Paolo Vella.
They stated clearly that the cession of Malta made by the Order did not have any legal effect and gave their reasons, quoting the Act of Capitulation and the fundamental principles of International Law.
So the whole question amounts to whether one accepts the Court of Appeal’s judgment.
My colleague Mr Galea is entitled to discard that judgment, also because he takes comfort, as he himself said, from the declarations of a British general in 1800 and a British statesman on the eve of the signing of the Treaty of Paris.
Contrary to these declarations, the Court of Appeal had no private interest (like Pigot, condemned even by Ball), or political interest (like Hobart) on how to decide the case.
They were simply objective in what they decided because they believed that their legal reasoning was the right one.
Since 1885 there has been no other judgment of the Maltese courts upsetting in the slightest what those three revered judges had to say.
Consequently, I feel perfectly justified in communicating to readers the contents of that judgment. The more so that another illustrious Maltese jurist, Judge Debono, agreed wholeheartedly with that judgment.
Indeed, he wrote in his standard book on the history of legislation in Malta that Civil Acts were ‘dictated’ by the French government, but invalidly (nullamente), because they had no power to enact them.
As if this were not enough, Prof. Giuseppe Degiorgio, who, like Judge Debono, taught History of English and Maltese Legislation at the University, wrote in his notes to the students that the various enactments of civil law made during the French occupation were considered as never having taken place.
Reason tells me I should abide by these pronouncements until someone takes it upon himself to go to court (as Lord Strickland did in the ultra vires cases) to seek a contrary judgment.
If this challenge is taken up, I eagerly await the result.