Law of nations

The early-modern doctrine of the mutual rights and duties of sovereign states -- the corpus of Grotius, Pufendorf, and Vattel that 18th-century statesmen 'usually recurred to' as authority on war, neutrality, treaties, and prisoners. Roman ius gentium is the pre-print root, but the discipline as Jefferson consults and prescribes it (Vattel's Law of Nations, Molloy De Jure Maritimo) is a 17th-18th-century print formation.