since those rules of international law, the violation or extension of which works such hardships on the nations which remain at peace, while sometimes marking-as with respect to contraband-a compromise between belligerent and neutral interest, have resulted largely from prize court decisions and from conferences of military and naval experts, both sources being greatly prejudiced in favor of the enlargement of belligerent right. In the present conflict, the United States has suffered very extensively and very vitally, not only on account of the magnitude of the struggle, but on account of the character of the violations of international law. On the part of one group of belligerents, these have involved only property rights and the question of damages is arbitrable. The other group of belligerents has taken over two hundred American lives-and the lives of at least two thousand other noncombatantsand has persisted in a policy so wanton that it could not be further endured.

As President Wilson said in April, 1916, when he threatened to break off diplomatic relations on account of the sinking of the Sussex, the Gov

ernment of the United States has been patient to the point of tolerance; it has accepted successive explanations and assurances in good faith, and it has made allowance for unprecedented conditions, but it could not continue to suffer violations of "the principles of humanity, the long established and incontrovertible rights of neutrals, and the sacred immunities of noncombatants." With only protests the United States time and time again answered acts which were fully justifiable grounds for hostilities, and which even seemed to invite a declaration of war. But the pronouncement of January 31, 1917-that, with an avowed disregard for neutral as well as enemy noncombatants, women and children as well as men, Germany would sink all merchant vessels-made vessels-made further friendly relations impossible; and the wholly unrestricted destruction-even of hospital ships -made war inevitable.1

1 The following dispatch, for example, appeared in the papers on April 29th:

"Copenhagen, April 28.-Announcement was made before the Reichstag main committee in Berlin yesterday that Germany will adopt the sharpest reprisals if German prisoners are embarked on hospital ships of the Allies and exposed to the danger of torpedoes.'

And now that hostilities have begun, it is worth while to attempt a history of our patient protests, for they tell the story of repeated indignities and contain an adequate statement of the undisputed legal principles upon which our position has rested. They justify to the utmost measure our going to war with Germany, while meeting England's naval activities with only argumentative protests. It is to the story of our negotiations with Germany and comment on the points of international law in issue, that this book will be devoted.

CHAPTER II

THE WAR ZONE DECREES AND GERMANY'S SUBMARINE “BLOCKADE’

THE right to use submarines against merchant vessels—and it is the assertion by Germany of that right to which the United States has objected is bound up with the question of war zones, strategic areas from which private vessels are warned. The latter problem is a new one in international law and as yet largely unregulated. One of the first applications of the principle that a certain portion of the high seas may be designated by belligerents; that therein they may exercise their rights of capture and sinking to the fullest degree, and that neutral vessels are more likely to come to grief on account of hostile operations, was in a Japanese ordinance issued two weeks before the outbreak of the war with Russia. Instead of a war zone the restricted vicinity was called a "defense sea

area,” and among other regulations merchant vessels were forbidden ingress and egress at night. This involved no important questions of international law,1 but in spite of the indefiniteness of the rules concerning war zones, several considerations may be ventured.

In the first place, while neutral vessels may be warned of impending danger if they enter the specified areas, it is indisputable that merely by conveying such a warning the belligerent acquires no additional rights within the zone other than those he has outside. The waters which are sought to be restricted remain a portion of the high seas and the neutral has a right to navigate them. Furthermore, while the Second Hague Peace Conference refused to adopt the proposal of the British delegation that the laying of mines in the open seas be absolutely prohibited, it is doubtful whether a belligerent has any right to sow mines in such places that neutral ships will be destroyed while engaged in peaceful navigation.2

1A good discussion of the problem is to be found in International Law Situations, 1912, pp. 114-139.

'Two recent English writers of high authority attach "no special importance to the declaration issued by the British