100 PARLIAMENTS OF THE DOMINIONS [pART It
has no effect except within territorial limits! It is true
that s. 5 of the Constitution Act exempts from the applica-
tion of the laws of the Commonwealth the Queen’s ships
of war, but that exemption is evidently intended to refer
to vessels of war under the control of the Crown, in its right
of the United Kingdom, and not to forces raised under the
authority of the Crown in Australia.
It is also clear that in other matters the Commonwealth
Parliament has extra-territorial jurisdiction. For example,
it is empowered to legislate by s. 51 (x) for the fisheries in
Australian waters beyond territorial limits, by sub-section vii
tor light-houses, light-ships, beacons, and buoys, and by sub-
section xxx for the relations of the Commonwealth with the
islands of the Pacific. It is also authorized to legislate by
sub-section xxix for external affairs, and by sub-sections xxvii
and xxviii for immigration and emigration, and the influx of
criminals, and these matters may require extra-territorial
control.
Moreover, it is provided by s. 5 of the Commonwealth of
Australia Constitution Act that the laws of the Common-
wealth shall be in force on all British ships, the Queen’s
ships of war excepted, whose first port of clearance and whose
port of destination are in the Commonwealth. The meaning
of that clause has been authoritatively interpreted by the
High Court of the Commonwealth in the case of The Merchant
Service Guild of Australasia v. Archibald Currie and Company
Proprietary, Limited.?
It was sought in that case to establish a jurisdiction of
the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration over
vessels which made round voyages from Calcutta to the Com-
monwealth and returned to Calcutta. It wasargued that this
section brought the ships within the ambit of the law of the
Commonwealth, and it was pointed out thats. 20 of the Federal
Council Act (48 & 49 Vict. ¢. 60) gave wide powers to the
See Australia Act No. 30 of 1910; Canada 9 & 10 Edw. VIL c. 43, and
of. Canada Revised Statutes, 1905, c. 111, which lays down a code of
discipline for government vessels. See also Parl. Pap., Cd. 5746-2,
* 5 C. L. R. 737. Cf. above, pp. 385, 386.
