(a) The Covenant of the League of Nations 303 (a) Dual Alliance, October 7, 1879 (b) Triple Alliance, May, 1882 3. RUSSO-FRENCH ALLIANCE (a) Projet de Convention Militaire, December, 1893 4. THE HOLY ALLIANCE ACT 5. CENTRAL AMERICAN TREATIES, December 20, 1907 (a) General Treaty of Peace and Amity (b) Convention for the Establishment of a Central 399 (c) Convention for the Establishment of an Interna- 406 (d) Convention Concerning Future Central American 6. HAGUE CONVENTIONS AND DRAFTS, 1907 . (a) Convention for the Pacific Settlement of Interna- . 409 411 4II (b) Draft Convention Relative to the Creation of a 431 (c) Convention Relative to the Creation of an Inter- 7. TREATY FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF PEACE BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND GUATEMALA, September 20, 1913. 438 455 INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION I. THE SOCIETY OF NATIONS IN 1914 II. THE BALANCE of PoweR AND THE CONcert of EuroPE III. HOW THE LEAGUE WAS BORN SALIENT FEATURES OF THE LEAGUE COVENANT PROPOSALS for a LEAGUE OF NATIONS IV. V. CHAPTER I THE SOCIETY OF NATIONS IN 1914 THE expression "League of Nations" as the name for the new international régime which was created by Part I of the Treaty of Versailles was not adopted without some dissent. Leagues of the past have not all had a beneficent influence, and some of the bloodiest wars in history have been waged in their name. To France particularly the term is of sinister meaning, associated as it is with her devastating religious wars of the sixteenth century. Her statesmen preferred the name "society" to indicate a voluntary association of equals drawn together for a common purpose. Société, not ligue, is therefore used in the French version of the treaty as the equivalent of "league." A society is something more than an association by agreement. It is the result of natural development; while a league has connected with it something of the idea of politics. Usage justifies the use of the word "nations" as synonymous with the word "states" to signify the politically organized communities which enter into international relations. Up to the time of Jeremy Bentham the rules applicable to these relations were collectively called the law of nations, and the expression coined by him, finternational law, apparently settled the usage for all time. But, legally speaking, a state and a nation are not the same. This is now a commonplace in popular works on the League of Nations as it has long been in technical works on international law. A state is defined as a sovereign political unity. It occupies a specified territory inhabited by people who owe allegiance to it, are protected by it, and who, as a unity, have no means of expressing themselves except through the agencies of state organization. A nation is less easily defined. By itself, it is neither sovereign, political, nor organized. Its unity comes from ties of blood, language, religion, customs, literature, and history. Races are neither states nor nations; they are ethnographical divisions of the world's population, such as the Caucasian, Mongolian, Ethiopian, and Malay races, and they are so widely scattered that scarcely any state or any nation is wholly composed of one race. It is possible, of course, for a nation to be organized into a state, thus adding the characteristics of one to the other. The attempt has been made in the re-mapping of Europe to make states out of national groups, and France was already an example of a state almost co-terminous with a nation. On the other hand, the British Empire is made up of many nationalities; so also is the United States. Switzerland is an example of a small state made up of several well-defined national groups, the chief of which have undoubted ties of blood, language, and literature with Germany, Italy, and France respectively. These have not yet been completely amalgamated into a Swiss nation, but the status of Switzerland as a state is not thereby affected.1 In the Preamble of the League of Nations Covenant the word "nation" is synonymous with "state". It speaks of just and honorable relations between "nations", of the dealings of "organized peoples", and rules of conduct for "governments" which are the political organs of states. Only self-governing states, dominions, or colonies may be members of the League, thus excluding from direct representation national groups which are not sepa Ruyssen (International Conciliation, March, 1917, p. 71–72) distinguishes between nation and nationality. "Nationality," he says, "in the abstract sense, is the characteristic of that which is national. But it is also, especially in the concrete sense, the totality of those ethnical elements which aspire to the dignity, the risks and the thrilling experiences of national life. Nationality is the nation in power, the nation attempting to realize itself and to play a part in history. It is made of similar but dissevered elements which would unite to form a common body and give it the functions necessary to a common life, in a word, to achieve unity and political sovereignty. "Unquestionably, the distinction between these ideas is frequently vague; 'nation' and 'nationality' may be used interchangeably to designate the same ethnic group. We may give the name of nation not only to existing states, where political unity visibly corresponds with a unity of homogeneous ethnical characteristics, but also to those states which have been deprived by the accident of history of this unity within such comparatively recent times that its memory still remains as an ideal for restoration." |