ia, destroys the payment made under it, and
revives the debt, and gives a right of recovery against the principal
debtor, notwithstanding such payment thereof, under the authority of
State law." In Hopkirk _v._ Bell[157] the Court further held that this
same treaty provision prevented the operation of a Virginia statute of
limitation to bar collection of antecedent debts. In numerous subsequent
cases the Court invariably ruled that treaty provisions supersede
inconsistent State laws governing the right of aliens to inherit real
estate.[158] Such a case was Hauenstein _v._ Lynham,[159] in which the
Court upheld the right of a citizen of the Swiss Republic, under the
treaty of 1850 with that country, to recover the estate of a relative
dying intestate in Virginia, to sell the same and to export the proceeds
from the sale.[160]

Recent Cases

Certain more recent cases stem from California legislation, most of it
directed against Japanese immigrants. A statute which excluded aliens
ineligible to American citizenship from owning real estate was upheld in
1923 on the ground that the treaty in question did not secure the rights
claimed.[161] But in Oyama _v._ California,[162] decided in 1948, a
majority of the Court indicated a strongly held opinion that this
legislation conflicted with the equal protection clause of Amendment
XIV, a view which has since received the endorsement of the California
Supreme Court by a narrow majority.[163] Meantime, California was
informed that the rights of German nationals, under the Treaty of
December 8, 1923 between the United States and the Reich, to whom real
property in the United States had descended or been devised, to dispose
of it, had survived the recent war and certain war legislation, and
accordingly prevailed over conflicting State legislation.[164]

WHEN IS A TREATY SELF-EXECUTING?

What is the scope of the power of American courts under article VI,
clause 2, to lend ear to private claims based on treaty provisions, on
the ground that such provisions are self-executing? Jay had in mind
certain intended victims of State legislation; and in fact the cases
reviewed above all arose within the normal field of State legislative
power. Nevertheless, as early as 1801, in United States _v._ Schooner
Peggy,[165] the Supreme Court, speaking by Chief Justice Marshall, took
notice of a treaty with France, executed after a court of admiralty had
entered a final judgment condemning a cap