all nations to coöperate toward securing a proper respect for the principles of international law, it may be said to enjoin similar action on the United States.1 The obligation, though equally binding upon us, cannot require us to act with the same energy and promptness as the powers nearer at hand and more vitally interested. International law, as now in operation, lays upon the states most directly concerned the burden of taking the requisite action to secure respect for its rules.

4. The right to make war and the equality of states

International law, as at present applied to the relations between states, is based on the fundamental principle of equality of the separate states before this law of nations. As Pascal said of custom, this principle owes its greatest force, perhaps, to the fact that it is accepted. For accepted it is, with a concurrence of opinion almost reaching unanimity. If an objection to the validity of the principle be raised, we must refer to the authorities and marshal the arguments in its favor.

If, for the purpose of this argument, we accept the principle, it follows necessarily that this equality between the states would have no meaning if the stronger could refuse

1 The United States is required only to make every reasonable effort to secure respect for Belgium's rights, which are the rights of all humanity: necessarily the rights of Germany, too, if she could but perceive it. It has been argued that we should intervene as signatories of the Hague Convention of October 18, 1907, respecting the rights and duties of neutral powers and persons in case of war on land. Article I of this convention reads: "The territory of neutral powers is inviolable." This article would apply to a neutralized state like Belgium as well as to a state neutral in the ordinary sense like Holland or Italy in the present war. In the case of Belgium the inviolability is sufficiently covered by the Treaty of April 19, 1839. Germany's ratification of this Hague Convention might, however, be taken as another indication that she expected to recognize the inviolability of Belgian territory. For that matter the convention is for the most part a restating of the recognized rules of international law, but since this treaty was not ratified by all the belligerents, it would not under its terms be applicable. The concern of the United States in the protection of Belgium's rights must therefore rest upon the general principles of international law.

to respect the recognized right of the weaker, or if the stronger could use his might to work his will in violation of the right of the weaker. It follows that no state is justified in making war except in the vindication of its rights. Such is, in truth, the principle recognized and observed by civilized states. What if the strong does, notwithstanding, appeal to arms and disregard the right of a weaker state? Has international law any means to check the violator? Yes; a means less direct and less immediate than in the case of violations of national law, though none the less sure in its effect. Public opinion throughout the world will work against the culprit, and in favor of the oppressed, until perhaps some combination of states is found to intervene and check the aggression. At times it is not easy to discover which side is right, so that other states are cautious lest they make a mistake and lest their intervention be considered a cloak to hide political designs. Unfortunately, in the past the political element in intervention has often been predominant. Each state is eager to protect the policies which lie closest to the hearts of the people, as being the expression of views peculiarly their own; that is, the views which they think right and wish to have adopted. To maintain the law pertaining to all the states and accepted by them does not require the same effort.

When a state has recourse to force, it is not possible to know at once the real motive, and to judge how far the action is justified. It results from this situation that when a state takes the law into its own hands and attacks another, there is no effective way of determining on the instant whether the action is a proper vindication of its rights or a more or less disguised violation of international law. This inability to discern the rights of the question and the consequences which will result from the prevalence of either of the opposing views led to the development of the condition of neutrality. Where two

political views are opposed to each other, it is natural that superior force should have its effect. It is only in the realm of law that the equality of weak and strong is reasonable.1

In the presence of a conflict between two opposing political views, interest and expediency alone determine whether a given state will throw its support to one side or the other. When in doubt, neutrality would be by far the safest course. Since the greater number of international disputes have related to political questions, neutrality has proved a useful institution, and has developed into a system recognized as part of the law of nations. This system of neutrality could never be meant to justify the nations in standing aside and in letting the strong crush the weak by violating clearly recognized principles of international law. If that were true, neutrality might serve in practice to authorize or make possible any violation of the law of nations. In the face of such a contradiction the whole system of the law of nations would fall to pieces.

The old conception of international law recognized this obligation of the nations, in the event of war, to take up arms against the unjust. In the case of political disputes, which were most frequently the cause of conflict, this principle could not be satisfactorily applied, and the idea of neutrality gradually ceased to be held in disrepute, until to-day it has become the rule for third states to adopt this status upon the outbreak of a war. By a natural confusion of ideas, the general practice of neutrality has been mistaken as a license for any state to have recourse to war at will. This would constitute a right to make war irre

1 The great jurist Westlake remarks à propos of the action of States in adopting new rules of international law: "Therefore, from time to time new rules have to be proposed on reasonable grounds, acted on provisionally, and ultimately adopted or rejected as may be determined by experience, including the effect, not less important in international than in national affairs, of interest coupled with preponderating power." (John Westlake, International Law, part 1, p. 15. Cambridge, 1910.)

spective of the cause. There could be no graver error, since the recognition of such a right would vitiate the highest law of humanity. It would make impossible the continued survival of small states, to the great detriment of mankind.

When we come to the question of settling conflicting views of rights, we find at once a difficulty in that the stronger state always finds some advantage in its strength to secure a better recognition of what it calls its right, sometimes to the total disregard of the superior right of a weaker state. The defect is not in the substantive law of nations, which is sufficiently well defined and discernible to indicate the right. It is due to the fact that when the interests, prejudices, and passions of a strong country cause it to take a view at variance with that held by another state, if this other be weaker, there is no direct means by which it can make good its rights. Its only champion is the opinion of other governments and the public opinion of the world, which may directly or indirectly compel some action in support of the weaker's right. At the present time, when the stronger comes into conflict with the weaker, if its view be not accepted, it often finds it possible to have recourse to war to enforce its views.

As we have seen, international law does not authorize the strong state thus to make use of its force to the disparagement of the right of the weaker. With no means of control for enforcing its rules, except the general public opinion which we have considered, international law has often to leave the conflict to run its course. This situation is to blame for that serious error of those who believe that international law allows the strong to have recourse to war to impose his will; in other words, that it constitutes a right to make war. The only rightful use of force is to establish right. Out of respect to this underlying principle there have slowly been developed certain methods of procedure. No state may rightly have recourse to force

until every peaceful means, reasonably possible of application, has been tried to settle the dispute.

5. Anglo-Belgian conversations

A pamphlet called "The Case of Belgium," containing facsimiles of documents found in the Belgian archives after the occupation of Brussels, has been widely circulated, with an introduction by Dr. Bernhard Dernburg, and a translation of an article in the North-German Gazette commenting upon them. A similar translation has been given out to the press, and may be considered as the inspired or semi-official defense of the German Government.

For the sake of convenience I reproduce here the translation, given in the pamphlet referred to above, of document 2 containing the minutes of a conference between the Belgian Chief of the General Staff, General Jungbluth, and the British Military Attaché, Lieutenant-Colonel Bridges:1

1 The other document (1) and the extract of another (3) are given among the Documents (see post, chap. XIII). Document 2 is reproduced here because it seems to be the briefest and most important of the three and contains the evidence upon which the charge against Belgium and England is rested. In the following summary adjoined to the documents, the most disputed assertions are contained in the italicized portion and one other sentence which I have underlined:

"SUMMARY OF THE SECRET DOCUMENTS

"I. The first document is a report of the Chief of the Belgian General Staff, Major-General Ducarme, to the Minister of War, reporting a series of conversations which he had had with the Military Attaché of the British Legation, Lieutenant-Colonel Barnardiston, in Brussels. It discloses that, as early as January, 1906, the Belgian Government was in consultation with the British Government over steps to be taken by Belgium, Great Britain and France against Germany. A plan had been fully elaborated for the landing of two British army corps in French ports to be transferred to the point in Belgium necessary for operations against the Germans. Throughout the conversation the British and Belgian forces were spoken of as "allied armies"; the British Military Attaché insisted on discussing the question of the chief command; and he urged the establishment, in the mean time, of a Belgian spy system in Germany.

"II. When in the year 1912 Lieutenant-Colonel Barnardiston had been succeeded by Lieutenant-Colonel Bridges as British Military Attaché in