ection of the one which alone can fill that character
often leads to appeals even up to the highest court. The residence of a
man's wife and family as contrasted with his place of business, his
exercise of political or municipal functions, and any conduct which
tends to connect his children with a given country, as by their
education or the start given them in life, as well as other indications,
are often cited as important; but none of them are in themselves
decisive. The situation must be considered as a whole. When the question
is between the domicile of origin and an alleged one of choice, its
solution is rendered a little easier than it is when the question is
between two alleged domiciles of choice, the burden of proof lying on
the party which contends that the domicile of origin has been abandoned.

In the state of the law which has been described it will not be found
surprising that an act of parliament, 24 & 25 Vict. c. 121, recites that
by the operation of the law of domicile the expectation and belief of
British subjects dying abroad with regard to the distribution of their
property are often defeated, and enacts that when a convention to that
effect has been made with any foreign country, no British subject dying
in such country shall be deemed to have acquired a domicile therein,
unless he has been resident in such country for one year previous to
death and has made a declaration in writing of his intention to become
domiciled; and that British subjects so dying without having so resided
and made such declaration shall be deemed for all purposes of testate or
intestate succession as to movables to retain the domicile they
possessed at the time of going to reside in such foreign country.
Similar exemptions are conferred on the subjects of the foreign state
dying in Great Britain or Ireland. But the act does not apply to
foreigners who have obtained letters of naturalization in any part of
the British dominions. It has not been availed of, and is indeed an
anachronism, ignoring as it does the fact that domicile has no longer a
world-wide importance, owing to the substitution for it of political
nationality as a test of private law in so many important countries. The
United States of America is not one of those countries, but there the
importance of domicile suffers from the habit of referring questions of
capacity to the law of the place of contract instead of to any personal
law. (JNO. W.)

DOMINI