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at the Second Peace of Paris, as has been already indicated, was given definite form in the celebrated declaration signed by Austria, France, Great Britain, Portugal, Prussia, and Russia. Eminent authorities have sharply differed touching the existence of an actual guarantee of Swiss and Savoyard neutrality, since the declaration undertakes to recognize Swiss perpetual neutrality, but guarantees the integrity and the inviolability only of its territory. There would appear, nevertheless, to be no doubt whatever as to the intention of the Powers at the Vienna Congress: it is expressly stated in the declaration of March 20, 1815, that an Act shall be drawn up recognizing and guaranteeing on the part of all the Powers Swiss perpetual neutrality; in the Sardinian memorial of March 26th Saint-Marsan asks for an extension of Swiss neutrality over Savoy as guaranteed by the Powers; in Article 92 of the Vienna Final Act this stipulation of the memorial takes shape in a clause stating that certain portions of upper Savoy shall be comprised within Swiss neutrality as recognized and guaranteed by the Powers; the protocol of November 3, 1815, declares also, when widening the sphere of Swiss neutrality in Savoy, that such widening shall extend the neutrality in the same manner as provided by Article 92 of the Vienna Final Act; and this provision was ratified by the Sardinian Government in its acte de remise of December 15, 1815; while in Article VII of the Sardinian treaty of March 16, 1816, which recapitulated the various provisions touching the extension of Swiss neutrality over Savoy, the terms "recognize" and "guarantee" are carefully quoted from the Second Peace of Paris in explanation of Savoy's claim to neutralization.

'There would appear, indeed, no doubt that it was an express guarantee which was both contemplated and actually declared at Vienna. This was required by the circumstances amid which the various transactions above enumerated were brought to a successful diplomatic conclusion.

Whether, in fact, we regard Swiss neutrality as a measure in its origin adopted as a refuge from the perils of attack from surrounding and powerful neighbors, or as a policy in part urged upon the country from without in order to secure to possible belligerents the advantages of what might be termed a safety-zone, all will admit that it has con

sistently served to develop a conception of devotion to country and also to expand civil freedom at home unstained by ambition of conquest abroad. Handed down, as it has been, through the centuries and protected in a later time by such safeguards as solemnly executed treaties and the principles of international law may throw about it, Swiss permanent neutrality may well be looked upon as a by no means insignificant element in the structure of modern world-civilization, while its preservation is essential as a bright example to the progress and perpetuation of that civilization itself.

There remains for consideration the maintenance by Switzerland of its neutrality during the European war, together with, in conclusion, the general aspects of permanent neutrality as attempted to be developed or preserved elsewhere.

GORDON E. SHERMAN.

CHANGE OF SOVEREIGNTY AND PRIVATE OWNERSHIP

OF LAND

I. THEORIES AND METHOD OF TREATMENT

PERHAPS no part of international law gives rise to more uncertainty and disagreement than the law which determines the resulting rights and duties of states and individuals upon a change of sovereignty, the so-called law of succession. One group of writers holds that the new sovereign succeeds to all the rights and obligations of the former sovereign with respect to the territory ceded. The new sovereign, it is said, like the Roman heir, is "universal successor" to the obligations as well as to the rights of the former sovereign. Grotius suggests the analogy of the Roman heir when he says: "Heredis personam, quoad dominii tam publici quam privati continuationem, pro eadem censeri cum defuncti persona, certi est juris" (Book II, Chap. IX, sec. 12). Again, he says: "Potest imperium victoria acquiri, ut est in rege alio imperante, et tunc in ejus jus succeditur" (Book III, Chap. VIII, sec. 2). This analogy, suggested by Grotius when international law was in the making, has had a remarkably strong influence upon the development of the rules of international law governing a change of sovereignty. Many writers of authority, following in the footsteps of Grotius, have laid it down that the new sovereign succeeds to all the obligations as well as to the rights of the former sovereign.1

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1 Halleck in his International Law (4th ed.), Vol. II, Chap. 34, sec. 27, p. 530, says: 'Complete conquest, by whatever mode it may be perfected, carries with it all the rights of the former government; or, in other words, the conqueror by the completion of his conquest, becomes, as it were, the heir and universal successor of the defunct or extinguished state." Hall in his International Law (5th ed.), p. 99, says: "When a state ceases to exist by absorption in another state, the latter in the same way is the inheritor of all local rights, obligations, and property." Speaking of the case of a territory which has won its independence, he says (p. 92): "Rights possessed in respect of the lost territory, including . . . obligations contracted with

Other writers, however, adopting the opposite extreme, declare that the new sovereign succeeds to none of the obligations resting upon the former sovereign. For instance, Keith, who made an exhaustive examination of the subject of succession as laid down in treaties, by text-writers, and in current practice, says:

It is submitted that cession, in itself, creates only a singular succession, that is a succession to rights and not to liabilities. . . . In any case in which the terms of the contract are not explicit the principle on which the question should be judged is that of a succession to rights and not to liabilities. Such a succession is really merely a substitution without any continuity. . . . It is submitted that the true doctrine of international law with regard to the annexation of states is that the annexing Power seizes all the rights in the country and its material resources, but it does not succeed to the obligations of the conquered government nor to such rights as were personal to that government.2

Between these two extremes of succession to all obligations, and succession to no obligations, there are adherents of almost every conceivable theory. But if the theorists and text-writers are irreconcilable in the various and diverse shades of opinion expressed, the practices of states are if possible even more so.

The subject of succession covers such widely differing phases, and these are dependent upon such diverse considerations and principles,

and has therefore a local charTo the same effect Rivier in Le successeur continue la

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reference to it alone, and property which is within it, acter, transfer themselves to the new state person." his Principes du Droit des Gens, Vol. I, p. 70, says: personalité économique et fiscale de l'État supprimé, avec ses avantages et ses charges, spécialement avec celle de la dette publique, en conformité des règles connues: Bona non intelliguntur nisi deducto aere alieno' et 'Res transit cum suo onere."" F. de Martens in his Traité de Droit International (translation by Leo), Vol. I, sec. 67, p. 368, says: "Les conséquences juridiques de l'absorption d'un État par un autre État rappellent les relations qui naissent entre particuliers à l'occasion de l'ouverture d'une succession. L'État qui s'est annexé le territoire d'un autre pays prend la place du, défunt' et lui succède complètement comme personne juridique. Il hérite de ses droits et de ses obligations." To the same effect are Despagnet, Droit International Public, No. 90; Bluntschli, Droit International, sec. 54; Heffter, Le Droit International, sec. 25, and many others.

Keith, Theory of State Succession, pp. 5, 6. Compare Appleton, Des effets des annexions de territoires; Gabba, Questioni di diritto civile; and Gidel, Des effets de l'annexion sur les concessions.

that nothing but confusion can result from the not uncommon method of treating them all as one homogeneous mass to be forced within the confines of a single rule. The general subject, it is submitted, should be divided under the different principles involved, and each one of these developed separately. One great branch falls under the general principle that change of sovereignty shall work no interference with private property rights. This principle has been well established by innumerable court decisions. It was first evolved to express the idea that a succession to another state's imperium involved no succession to the dominium of privately owned property. From its form as first laid down, the rule has been much extended and broadened; so that today it contains the further idea that all individual rights which constitute "property" shall be protected from confiscation through mere cession. In cases arising under this principle any distinction between "universal" and "partial" succession, or between cession and conquest, would seem useless and immaterial, productive of unnecessary confusion and complexity, and indefensible in theory.3 In this branch of the subject, strictly speaking, there is no question of true succession at all; there is no stepping into the shoes of one nation by another, no question of a receiving state succeeding to the obligations and rights of a ceding state. It is simply a question, often attended with considerable difficulty, of the application of the rule that upon the event of cession private property shall not be confiscated. Under this branch of the law of succession will fall the discussion to which this paper will be confined,* of the effect of a change of sovereignty upon private rights in land within the ceded territory. Such a discussion will have nothing to do with a second branch which con

For an interesting statement to the effect that any distinction in this branch of the law between universal and partial succession, or between cession and conquest is indefensible, see an article by Pierre Descamps in 15 Revue Générale de Droit International Public, pp. 396, 397. Compare also the statement of the Transvaal Concessions Commission: "In considering what the attitude of the conqueror should be towards such concessions, we were unable to perceive any sound distinction between a case where a state acquires part of another state by cession and a case where it acquires the whole by annexation." Report of Transvaal Concessions Commission, British Parliamentary Papers, 1901, So. Africa, Cd. 623.

4 A subsequent paper will deal with the effect of a change of sovereignty upon concessions and franchises.

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