But the public opinion of the world grew. Nations began to make obligatory treaties of arbitration with one another. Hundreds of such treaties were made. The United States made some thirty such treaties with most of the principal countries in the world agreeing absolutely to arbitrate questions arising under international law and upon the interpretation of treaties.

A strong opinion arose in favor of establishing an international court composed of judges who would devote their entire time to the business of the court. The Second Hague Conference adopted a plan for such a court, and while Mr. Knox was Secretary of State he negotiated a treaty with the other great Powers for its effective establishment. It became evident that the world was ready for obligatory arbitration of justiciable questions.

After the great war began the American "League to Enforce Peace," at the head of which are Mr. Taft and Mr. Lowell, made the first plank in its platform that "All justiciable questions arising between the signatory Powers not settled by negotiation shall-subject to the limitation of treaties-be submitted to a judicial tribunal for hearing and judgment, etc."

A similar group in Great Britain, of which Lord Bryce was a leading spirit, made the first plank in its platform the following:

The signatory Powers to agree to refer to the existing Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague, or to the Court of Arbitral Justice proposed at the Second Hague Conference, if and when such court shall be established, or to some other arbitral tribunal, all disputes between them (including those affecting honor and vital interests) which are of a justiciable character, and which the Powers concerned have failed to settle by diplomatic methods.

And both of these groups proposed to provide for enforcing the judgments of the court by economic pressure or by force.

The other class of disputes which give rise to war consists of clashes between conflicting national policies, as distinguished from claims of legal right. They do not depend upon questions of law or treaty, but upon one nation or ruler undertaking to do something that another nation or ruler wishes to prevent.

Such questions are a part of international politics. They are similar to the questions as to which our courts say "This is a political question, not a judicial question, and we have no concern with it." The question whether Russia should help Servia when Austria in

vaded Servia in July, 1914, is an illustration. Our own Monroe Doctrine is another illustration. That is not an assertion of any legal right, but it is a declaration that certain acts will be regarded as dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States and therefore unfriendly.

Such questions are continually arising in Europe and the Near East, and the way in which the European countries have been in the habit of dealing with them has been to bring about a conference of the representatives of the different nations to discuss the subject and find some way of reconciling the differences, or of convincing the parties to the dispute that it would not be safe for them to break the peace.

For example, in 1905, when the German Emperor's dramatic challenge of the policy of France as to Morocco had made war seem probable, the Algeciras Conference was brought about largely by the influence of President Roosevelt and that conference resulted in preventing war. In 1912, when the Balkan wars had brought Europe apparently to the verge of universal war, the Ambassadors of all the great Powers met in London and the result of their conference was to avert war. So, in the last week of July, 1914, Sir Edward Grey tried to bring about another conference for the purpose of averting the great war in which we have been engaged, but Germany refused to attend the conference, and she refused because she meant to bring on the war, and knew that if she attended a conference it would become practically impossible for her to do so.

The weak point about this practice of international conferences in times of danger was that they were left solely to the initiative of the individual nations; that nobody had a right to call a conference and nobody was bound to attend one.

The great and essential thing about the plan contained in this "Constitution for a League of Nations" is that it makes international conferences on political questions compulsory in times of danger; that it brings together such conferences upon the call of officers who represent all the Powers and makes it practically impossible for any nation to keep out of them.

This effect is produced by the provisions of Article 15, relating to the submission of disputes to the Executive Council of the League or upon demand of either party to the Body of Delegates. Article 15 is the central and controlling article of the agreement. Putting

out of consideration for the moment Article 10, which relates to a mutual guarantee of territory, Articles 8 and 9, which relate to the reduction of armaments, and Article 19, which relates to mandataries, all the other important articles in the agreement are designed to make effective the conference of the Powers resulting from the submission of a dispute upon a question of policy under Article 15.

Especially important among these ancillary articles is Article 11, which declares war or threat of war to be a matter of concern to the whole League; Article 12, which prohibits going to war without the submission of the dispute and without allowing time for its settlement, or contrary to a unanimous recommendation of the Executive Council or an award of arbitrators (if there shall have been an arbitration), and Article 16, which provides for enforcing the provisions of Article 12 by economic boycott or, should the Powers choose to do so, by military force.

I think these provisions are well devised and should be regarded as free from any just objection, so far as they relate to the settlement of the political questions at which they are really aimed. The provisions, which, taken together, accomplish this result, are of the highest value. They are developed naturally from the international practice of the past. They are a great step forward. They create an institution through which the public opinion of mankind, condemning unjust aggression and unnecessary war, may receive, effect, and exert its power for the preservation of peace, instead of being dissipated in fruitless protest or lamentation. The effect will be to make the sort of conference which Sir Edward Grey tried in vain to get for the purpose of averting this great war obligatory, inevitable, automatic. I think everybody ought to be in favor of that.

I repeat that this scheme for the settlement of political questions such as brought about the present war is of very great practical value and it would be a sad thing if this opportunity for the establishment of such a safeguard against future wars should be lost.

This plan of automatic conference, however, is accompanied by serious defects.

The scheme practically abandons all effort to promote or maintain anything like a system of international law or a system of arbitration, or of judicial settlement, through which a nation can assert its legal rights in lieu of war. It is true that Article 13 mentions arbitration and makes the parties agree that whenever a dispute

arises "which they recognize to be suitable for submission to arbitration," they will submit it to a court "agreed upon by the parties." That, however, is merely an agreement to arbitrate when the parties choose to arbitrate, and it is therefore no agreement at all. It puts the whole subject of arbitration back where it was twenty-five years ago.

Instead of perfecting and putting teeth into the system of arbitration provided for by The Hague Conventions it throws those conventions upon the scrap heap. By covering the ground of arbitration and prescribing a new test of obligation it apparently by virtue of the provisions of Article 25 abrogates all the two hundred treaties of arbitration by which the nations of the world have bound themselves with one another to submit to arbitration all questions arising under international law, or upon the interpretation of treaties.

It is to be observed that neither the Executive Council nor the Body of Delegates to whom disputes are to be submitted under Article 15 of the agreement is in any sense whatever a judicial body or an arbitral body. Its function is not to decide upon anybody's right. It is to investigate, to consider and to make recommendations. It is bound to recommend what it deems to be expedient at the time. It is the states which act and not the individuals. The honorable obligation of each member is a political obligation as the representative of a state.

This is a method very admirable for dealing with political questions; but it is wholly unsuited to the determination of questions of right under the law of nations. It is true also that Article XIV mentions a Court of International Justice, and provides that the Executive Council should formulate plans for such a court, and that this court shall when established be competent to determine matters which the parties recognize as suitable for submission to it. There is no agreement or direction that such a court shall be established or that any questions shall be submitted to it.

International law is not mentioned at all, except in the preamble, no method is provided, and no purpose is expressed to insist upon obedience to law, to develop the law, to press forward agreement upon its rules and recognition of its obligations. All questions of right are relegated to the investigation and recommendation of a political body to be determined as matters of expediency.

I confess I cannot see the judgment of three generations of the

wisest and best of American statesmen concurred in by the wisest and the best of all our allies thus held for naught. I believe with them that necessary as may be the settlement of political questions upon grounds of expediency-it is also necessary to insist upon rules of international conduct founded upon principles, and that the true method by which public right shall be established to control the affairs of nations is by the development of law and the enforcement of law according to the judgments of impartial tribunals. I should have little confidence in the growth or permanence of an international organization which applied no test to the conduct of nations except the expediency of the moment.

The first change which I should make in this agreement accordingly would be to give effectiveness to the judicial settlement of international disputes upon questions of right-upon justiciable or judicial questions-by making the arbitration of such questions obligatory under the system established by The Hague Conferences, or before the proposed Court of Arbitral Justice, or, if the parties prefer in any particular case, before some specially constituted tribunal; putting the whole world upon the same footing in that respect that has been created between the United States and practically every nation now represented in Paris, by means of the special treaties which we have made with them. The term "Justiciable Questions" should be carefully defined, so as to exclude all questions of policy, and to describe the same kind of questions the Supreme Court of the United States has been deciding for more than a century. When that is done the reference to arbitration in Article XII will have some force and effect instead of being as it is now-a mere idle form.

The second change which I think should be made is to provide for a general conference followed by regular conferences at stated intervals to discuss, agree upon and state in authentic form the rules of international law, so that the development of law may go on, and arbitral tribunals may have continually a more perfect system of rules of right conduct to apply in their decisions.

I send you herewith drafts of two suggested amendments designed to accomplish these results.

The distinction between the treatment of questions of legal right and questions of policy which I have drawn above has an important