PROTECTORATE. - I. NATURE AND ORIGIN. - The religious or missionary protectorate consists in a convention by which the Christian powers protect Christians or Christian institutions in infidel countries. Its scope is not always the same and may extend only to the missions of the protecting State, or to all missions without regard to nationality, or finally even to all Christians of the respective non-Christian country. Juridically, therefore, the protectorate is a kind of state servitude, which gives the protecting State the right to intervene in favor of the protected persons and objects, such as religious buildings, convents, charitable institutions, schools, missions. The missionary protectorate originated as a result of conventions or customary law and generally because of a deficient administration of justice in certain countries or because of the necessity of protecting the Christian religion.
Although the missionary protectorate can easily give rise to abuses, from the theological point of view it is upheld because missionary activity can be protected by international conventions. The theological bases, as well as the limits and conditions of the protectorate, were established by Suárez in the treatise De fide against the protectorate of Sanchez, who wanted military intervention to convert China. The Holy See, while not excluding the protectorate (AAS, 18 [1926]), p. 306 ff.) has always sought to safeguard the national interests of non-Christian peoples and to protect missionary work from political interference, as is easy to observe from the efforts to have its own representation for the erection of a nunciature in Beijing in 1895 and in 1918; for the formation of a national clergy and the introduction of an indigenous hierarchy (Message of Pius XI to China, in AAS, 20 [1928]), p. 245 ff.). In international law the protection of the Christian religion, already previously in force (cf. Congo Act, 1895), was slowly replaced by the principle of freedom of conscience and religion (cf. Revision of the Congo Act, 1919).
II. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
The foundation of the international law of the protectorate is found in the so-called capitulations between Christian states and Mohammedan princes, which go back to the Middle Ages. By means of these the state sovereignty of the country of residence is abolished in favor of the personal sovereignty of the representatives and citizens of the stipulating state. They came about following the increase in commercial relations with the East after the Crusades. J. Dindinger in the Bibliotheca Missionum, XV (Freiburg im Br. 1951, pp. 74-79) gives a complete list of the capitulations for Africa. Pisa was the first state to stipulate a pact (1133) with a Mohammedan prince (Morocco). There followed, then, Venice (1217), Genoa (1236), France (1270), Aragon (1274), Florence (1422). In all these capitulations there is no mention of missions strictly speaking, that is, of the right to propagate the Christian faith. Therefore the term missionary protectorate must be understood in a broad sense, insofar as these were mission countries. The persons protected in the pacts with the Italian cities and with Aragon are exclusively the citizens of the stipulating countries. The French pact, on the other hand, extends to all priests and religious. In modern times France made efforts to obtain in the Near East and in North Africa a universal protectorate over all Christians. In the pact with Turkey (1604) for the first time it is stated in clear words that all pilgrims of Jerusalem had to travel with the permission and under the protection of the King of France. In the pact of Louis XIV with Turkey (1673) the French consul is granted the right of precedence over all other consuls. In a subsequent treaty (1685) in art. 19 the right of protectorate of France over all Christian missionaries is established. France acted on its own initiative and not on behalf of the Holy See, which limited itself to recognizing the accomplished fact. In an act of gratitude, Propaganda granted the French consuls of the Levant the so-called honors (procession before and after the solemn Mass at Christmas, Easter and Pentecost from the door of the church to the seat of honor and vice versa, the honor of incense before the other faithful). Despite this France never had the missionary protectorate exclusively. Also of great importance was the Austrian protectorate of a supranational character (1615), that of Russia over the Orthodox (1681, 1774), of Prussia (1761) and of Germany (1878): the latter, however, only in favor of their own citizens. The missionary protectorate came to an end in the Near East in 1914 and respectively 1923 with the abolition of the capitulations. In the Peace Treaty of Lausanne (1923) Turkey assumed the protection of religious minorities under the supervision of the League of Nations. The liturgical honors, rearranged in two agreements of Dec. 4, 1926 (AAS, 19 [1927], p. 9 ff.) do not signify a return to the protectorate but are a free recognition of the services rendered in times past.
III. THE MISSIONARY PROTECTORATE IN CHINA
The first capitulation imposed on China by a Christian power was the article of the Russo-Chinese peace treaty of 1727 in which the Russians were granted the right to erect a church in Beijing. In the treaties of 1844, after the Opium War, the United States of America and France obtained the right to erect churches, hospitals and cemeteries for their own subjects in the five free ports. At the request of Lagrené, extraordinary envoy of France, an imperial decree was issued on 20 February 1846 in which the profession of the Catholic religion was permitted; Catholics were authorized to build places of worship throughout China, to pray, to venerate crucifixes and images and to preach without any obstacle; it was ordered that the churches built under Kangxi be restored to worship; that the local authorities who persecuted true Catholics should be punished. Foreigners, however, were forbidden to penetrate into the interior to preach, outside the five free ports. The decree, however, was not published in due form and France could not intervene officially in this sense. Wherefore the situation remained the same. In 1851 Russia obtained the same rights for its own subjects in the commercial cities of the province of Ili. By the Treaties of Tientsin in 1858 between China and the United States, England and France, religious freedom was extended to the interior and the Chinese were permitted to embrace the Christian religion. Art. 13 of the French Treaty established that effective protection would be given to missionaries who traveled peacefully into the interior of the country, furnished with passports, according to art. 2. No obstacle could be opposed by the Chinese authorities to the right of every Chinese to embrace Christianity freely and no penalty was to be inflicted for this reason. There follows then the formal revocation of all previous anti-Christian laws. Since France was the only Catholic power stipulating, it obtained the missionary protectorate comprising all Catholic missionaries with French passports of whatever nationality. In the Treaty of Beijing (1860) France obtained that missionaries could own real estate. One thing alone had been forgotten in all these pacts: the right of the mission to erect a school. France, however, did not obtain from the Holy See the extension of liturgical honors to China as well. After the arrival of the first German missionaries in China (1882), the German government let the French government know that it itself would take in hand the protection of its own missionaries. After some hesitation, Propaganda in 1889 left the German missionaries free choice between the French or German passport and protectorate. In the Peace of Versailles (1919) Germany renounced all claims of protectorate in China.
At the same time as Germany, Italy too (1888) assumed the protectorate over its own missionaries. At first
Propaganda did not agree (Letter of Propaganda of 11 February 1890 to the apostolic vicar of Hong Kong), but then from 1902, tacitly, it consented. In order to maintain its protectorate, France prevented in the years 1881, 1885 and 1918 the attempts at diplomatic relations between China and the Holy See requested by China. The apostolic delegation erected in 1922 did not have a diplomatic character and changed nothing in the state of the protectorate in force. In February 1943 China sent an ambassador to the Holy See.
The Holy See erected an internunciature in China in 1946, France having on 28 February 1946 in the Chungking pact renounced all rights deriving from the unequal treaties. This fact and the step of the Holy See abolished the protectorate.