IN THE COURTS OF THE NATIONS - DataSpace - Princeton ...

ordered Assayag to stop paying Zagury and instead pay the higher rent directly to the ḥubs. 89
Assayag complied with the nāẓir’s request. Zagury, however, sued Assayag for allegedly
breaking their sublease agreement. Assayag wrote to the local French consul and requested that
the case be brought before a sharī‘a court:
According to the laws of property established in Morocco, [and] in my quality of French
subject, which I have the honor to be due to [my involvement in] the real estate business,
it seems to me that the case should be judged by the Muslim sharī‘a; I thus desire that
justice be executed morally. 90
The French vice-consul in Casablanca and Laurent-Charles Féraud, the French ambassador to
Morocco, concurred that the case should go before a qāḍī since it involved real estate. 91
However, their colleague the Portuguese consul did not agree and attempted to force Assayag to
pay Zagury the rest of the money Assayag allegedly owed without recourse to a sharī‘a court. 92
The Portuguese minister and Zagury protested that the contract was signed between two
foreigners, and thus had nothing to do with the Islamic legal system. 93 Nonetheless, the French
vice-consul, Assayag, and the nāẓir succeeded in bringing the case before the local qāḍī, who
ruled in Assayag’s favor. 94 The verdict hinged on the fact that it was the nāẓir’s duty to pursue
the best interests of the endowment with which he was charged. The nāẓir thus had no choice
but to rent the store to the person who would pay a higher sum. 95
The case of Assayag v. Zagury indicates the ways in which treaties regulating consular
jurisdiction often coincided with the interests of the individuals concerned. It is likely that
89
The nāẓir and Assayag claimed that Zagury’s contract to rent the ḥubs store expired at the same time as the
contract between Zagury and Assayag, which allowed them to switch the initial contract from Zagury to Assayag.
90
MAE Nantes, Tanger B 1325, Assayag to Callomb, 30 August 1887.
91
MAE Nantes, Tanger B 1325, Féraud to Callomb, 15 December 1887.
92
Ibid.
93
MAE Nantes, Tanger B 1325, Portuguese Consul to Féraud, 31 December 1887.
94
MAE Nantes, Tanger B 1325, Callomb to Féraud, 26 December 1887. The qāḍī was ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Barīs.
95
MAE Nantes, Tanger B 1325, ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Barīs to Muḥammad Slama, 19 December 1887; ‘Abd al-
Raḥmān al-Barīs to Muḥāmmad al-Ṭūris, 16 January 1888.
315