duration of seven years or until the end of the Third Peace Conference, if this date is prior.

The contracting powers engage to consider again the question of the use of submarine automatic contact mines six months before the expiration of the period of the seven years, in case it has not been again taken up and decided by the Third Conference of Peace at a previous date.

In the absence of the stipulations of a new convention, the present regulation shall continue in force, unless this convention is denounced. The denunciation shall not take effect (with regard to the notifying power) until six months after the notification.

It was sought, notably by Great Britain, to prevent any nation from placing submarine mines beyond its territorial waters, namely, the three-mile limit. It was objected to this that while the offensive use of mines might be limited, it was inadvisable, perhaps unreasonable, at the present time to limit the defensive use of mines. In one case the mines would be used as a means of attack; in the second place as a defense against aggression. The latter view commended itself to the conference, and, after much discussion, it was agreed not to introduce into the convention any provision upon the subject.

The ninth convention forbade the bombardment by naval forces of undefended harbors, villages, towns, or buildings. The presence, however, of military stores would permit bombardment of such ports for the sole purpose of destroying the stores, provided they were not destroyed or delivered up upon request. Notice, however, should be given of the intention to bombard. In like manner, the convention permitted the bombardment of such undefended places if provisions were not supplied upon requisition to the naval force. Bombardment, however, was not allowed for the collection of mere money contributions. It should be said that unoffending property was not to be bombarded or destroyed, and buildings and institutions devoted to a religious, scientific, or charitable purpose were expressly excluded from attack.

This convention will undoubtedly subserve a useful purpose and clear up a doubt which seems to have existed. The weight of opinion forbade the bombardment of undefended ports. The fear, however, that such ports might be attacked and held, in order to enforce submission, rendered a convention on this subject, even although declaratory of international usage and custom, of no little moment. We all remember the Spanish-American War and the constant fear, however

unfounded, that the Atlantic Coast might be bombarded by the Spanish fleet.

The tenth convention adapted to maritime warfare the principles of the Geneva Convention of 1906. It is not necessary to describe this admirable document in detail. We are familiar with the Red Cross and its work, and there exists absolute unanimity of opinion that the sick and wounded upon the battlefield or upon the high seas should be cared for, irrespective of nationality. Humanity demands it and this demand has been carefully complied with. A word of history may, however, be permitted. The first Geneva convention, dealing with land warfare, was drawn up in 1864. The additional articles of 1868, extending the principles of land warfare to naval warfare, failed of adoption. In 1899 the additional articles were made the basis of a convention dealing with this question adopted at the First Hague Convention. Warfare, however, had changed since 1864, and it was felt that the provisions of the Geneva Convention of 1864 should keep pace with the changed conditions, so in 1906 the Geneva Convention of 1864 was revised and the present conference adapted the provisions of this revised convention of 1906 to naval warfare. It is not necessary to enlarge upon the importance of this convention. We understand it and are proud of the progress it marks, in succoring the sick and the wounded and mitigating in their extreme rigor the evils necessarily incident to war.

The eleventh convention relates to certain restrictions in the exercise of the right of capture in maritime war. It is a modest document, but is all that was saved from the wreck of the immunity of private property. The American delegation urged the abolition of the right of capture of unoffending enemy private property upon the high seas, but great maritime powers such as Great Britain, France, Russia, and Japan were unwilling to relinquish this means of bringing the enemy to terms. A convention negotiated by powers having no great maritime interest might be a moral victory; it would not be of practical importance except as embodying in conventional form the advanced and radical views of this subject. But to return to the present convention. Chapter 1 frees from capture mail upon a vessel if not directed to or coming from a blockaded port. Chapter 2 frees from capture fishing smacks devoted solely to coastal fishing and small vessels engaged in local navigation. It is pleasing to note that the conference made the basis of its action the decision of

the Supreme Court of the United States in the well-known case of The Paquette Habana, 1899, 175 U.S. 677. Chapter 3 regulated the legal condition of the crew of an enemy merchant vessel by providing that subjects of neutral states were exempt from capture and that subjects of the enemy state were likewise exempt from capture, provided they gave an oath not to serve during the continuance of the war. These provisions are indeed modest when we consider the vast subject involved. They are, however, humaritarian, and therefore to be commended.

The twelfth convention sought to establish an international court of prize, and there only remains the ratification of this convention by the contracting powers in order to call into being this great and beneficent institution. For years, enlightened opinion has protested against the right of belligerents to pass final judgment upon the lawfulness of the capture of neutral property, and it is a pleasure to be able to state that the interests of the neutrals in the neutral prize are henceforward to be placed in the hands of neutral judges with a representation of the belligerents, in order that the rights of all concerned may be carefully weighed and considered.

It is understood that Norway intended to present a project for the establishment of a court of prize. It is a fact that both Germany and Great Britain presented a project for the establishment of a prize court at the first business session of the conference. The projects, however, were widely divergent. In one, the continental idea. prevailed; in the other, the Anglo-Saxon idea dominated. It was impossible to convince either of the advantage of the other plan. Matters were at a standstill, when the American delegation, through Mr. Choate, proposed a basis of compromise which, accepted by both, resulted in the establishment of the court.

The provisions of this convention are technical and detailed as must be the case in which an institution is to be created and its jurisdiction and procedure defined within the compass of a single document. It is impossible, therefore, to discuss it at any length, but it would be an unpardonable omission if mention were not made of its salient features. In the first place, national prize courts are to officiate as in times past. One appeal is allowed from a national court to a higher court of the captor's country. Thereupon, at the expiration of two years an appeal may be taken directly from the national court and the case transferred from the national court to

the international prize court at The Hague. This court thereupon becomes seized of the law and the facts involved in the case, and the decision pronounced becomes final and binding upon the litigant parties.

It should be stated that while the prize court is chiefly a court for nations instead of for individuals, still the individual suitor, unless expressly prohibited by his country, may himself appeal and transfer the case, should his country be indisposed to appear before the bar as his representative. It may not be inappropriate to state that the institution of the court is in itself a recognition of the fact that the individual is not without standing in modern international law.

In discussing the matter of the prize court, President Roosevelt aptly said, in his recent message:

Any one who recalls the injustices under which this country suffered as a neutral power during the early part of the last century can not fail to see in this provision for an international prize court the great advance which the world is making towards the substitution of the rule of reason and justice in place of simple force. Not only will the international prize court be the means of protecting the interests of neutrals, but it is in itself a step towards the creation of the more general court for the hearing of international controversies to which reference has just been made. The organization and action of such a prize court can not fail to accustom the different countries to the submission of international questions to the decision of an international tribunal, and we may confidently expect the results of such submission to bring about a general agreement upon the enlargement of the practice.

The thirteenth convention concerns and seeks to regulate the rights and duties of neutral powers in case of maritime war. This is an elaborate codification of the rights and duties of neutrals in which the conference essayed to generalize and define on the one hand the rights of neutrals and the correlative duties of the belligerents, and in the second place to set forth in detail the duties of neutrals, thus safeguarding the rights of belligerents in certain phases of maritime warfare. The belligerents are forbidden to commit hostilities within the territory or the territorial waters of neutrals and are forbidden to make a neutral port or neutral territory the basis of naval operations. The neutral is likewise forbidden to permit such conduct; the belligerent is forbidden to equip, provision, or to procure ammunition for a warlike purpose within neutral ports, and the neutral is required to prevent such use of its territory. The enemy

men-of-war are forbidden to remain beyond a certain period in neutral harbors. If vessels of the other enemy be present, the order in which the vessels shall leave is prescribed, so that hostilities may not begin within neutral jurisdiction. There are other and important provisions in the convention which aim to codify existing custom, with the addition of provisions thought to be necessary or highly desirable. The result, however, was unsatisfactory to some of the larger maritime powers, which prefer their present regulations on the subject of neutrality or which were unwilling to accept the modifications proposed. The United States was not satisfied with certain provisions of the convention and reserved the right to study the project in detail before expressing a final opinion. It therefore abstained from voting and signing.

The fourteenth convention is a reenactment of the declaration of 1899 forbidding the launching of projectiles and explosives from balloons. The original declaration was agreed to for a period of five years, and as this period had expired the powers were without a regulation on the subject. The reënactment provided that the present declaration shall extend, not merely for a period of five years, but to the end of the Third Conference of Peace. It is difficult to say whether the declaration is important or not. It is, however, evidence. of the fact that the conference believed that land and water offer a sufficient field for warfare without extending it to a newer element, the air.

Such is, in brief, the content of the fourteen conventions, including a declaration, previously enumerated. The Final Act then passes to the less formal results:

The conference, inspired by the spirit of compromise and reciprocal concession which pervades its deliberations, adopted the following declarations which, reserving to each of the represented powers the benefit of its votes, allows them to affirm the principles which they consider as unanimously recognized.

It is unanimous: (1) In accepting the principle for obligatory arbitration; (2) in declaring that certain differences, and notably those relating to the interpretation and application of international conventional stipulations, are susceptible of being submitted to obligatory arbitration without any restriction.

It was a matter of great regret to the thirty-two powers voting in behalf of a general treaty of obligatory arbitration, against which there were only nine votes recorded, that the opponents of this great and beneficent measure stood upon the rights of the minority to block the will of the majority; but as Germany and Austria refused