against Germany, we need not be surprised to find an occasional slip. which blurs the facts or at least fails to present a complete statement of the case. For example, on page 20, we read, "In her White Book Germany states positively that she assured Austria that any action which that country might consider it necessary to take toward Servia would meet her approval." This needs qualification. What Germany, according to the document mentioned, actually did say was that she would support Austria in "any action she (Austria) considered necessary to put an end to the movement in Serbia directed against the integrity of the monarchy." Germany claimed "to be guided in her action only by her duties as an ally.”

Again, on page 173, discussing Treitschke's political theories, we read, "Have they (States) any moral obligations to each other? Treitschke answers distinctively in the negative." It would be interesting to know where Treitschke makes any such statement. No reference is given, but no one can read his "Politics" and come to any such conclusion. It would be difficult to find a modern writer on politics who preaches morality within a state and between states more insistently. He is indeed the apostle of force and power, but he does not advocate the Machiavellian theory of power as the author assumes. In the last chapter of his "Politics" he specifically denies Machiavelli's view of the state: "A state which went upon the theory of despising faith and loyalty would be constantly threatened by enemies and would consequently be unable to fulfil its purpose of being physical power." While agreeing with Machiavelli that the state is power, Treitschke does not fail to note "the deep immorality of much else in his political teaching." The following quotations are taken from Balfour's edition of Treitschke and fairly represent Treitschke's views on this point: "It is at once clear that as a great institution for the education of the human race, the state must necessarily be subject to the moral law" (1:89). "We must then admit the validity of the moral law in relation to the state and that it cannot be correct to speak absolutely of collisions between the two" (1:92). "Thus the state cannot disregard with impunity the law to which its moral being is subject" (1:98). "Wisdom is not merely an intellectual, but a moral virtue in the statesman who is responsible for the fate of millions" (1:98).

I call attention to these facts, not so much to criticise the value of the volume under review, for it is comparatively free from such

errors, but rather in the hope that American scholarship, now that the peace treaty has been signed, may resume its discussion of political theories in a more critical spirit. Political theories of the state should not be confused with actual government, or with practices of rulers during a war.

KARL F. GEISER.

League of Nations. By L. Oppenheim, M.A., LL.D. London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1919, pp. xii, 84.

Pursuant to the injunction which Dr. Whewell, the founder of the Chair of International Law at Cambridge University, England, laid upon every holder of the Chair that he "make it his aim" in all parts of his treatment of the subject, "to lay down such rules and suggest such measures as may tend to diminish the evils of war and finally to extinguish war between nations," Dr. Oppenheim, the present occupant of the Chair, delivered during the course of the War, three lectures at the University on a League of Nations. book comprises the three lectures thus delivered.

This

Dr. Oppenheim confines these lectures to drawing attention to the links which connect the proposal for a league of nations with the past, and to the difficulties with which the realization of the proposal must necessarily be attended, and to some schemes by which these difficulties might be overcome.

He briefly touches upon the early attempts to form a league of nations, calling attention to the proposal of Pierre Dubois in 1305 for an alliance between all Christian Powers for the maintenance of peace and for the establishment of a permanent court of arbitration for the settlement of differences between the members of the alliance; and to the schemes of Martini in 1461, Sully in 1603, Crucee in 1623 and Grotius in 1625. He also reviews the progress made in our time in this direction by the Hague Peace Conference and the so-called Bryan Peace Treaties. He emphatically states that the organization of a League of Nations should start from the beginning made by the Hague Peace Conferences.

The aims of the League of Nations, in his opinion, should be confined to preventing the resort to war on account of so-called judicial disputes, by having these disputes submitted to an international

court of justice; to preventing the sudden outbreak of war on account of political disputes by providing for the submission of such disputes to an international council of conciliation before resorting to arms; and to providing a sanction for the enforcement of these safeguards by uniting the forces of the member states against a state or states resorting to arms without previously having submitted the dispute to an international court, or international council of conciliation.

To realize these aims for the league he considers that the organization of the league should comprise an international legislature, an international court, and international councils of conciliation.

With regard to the international legislature (using the word "legislature" in a figurative sense only), Dr. Oppenheim proposes to start from the beginning made by the Hague Conferences and have periodical meetings of these conferences for the purpose of continuing their work of gradually codifying international law.

He points out the difficulties of such international legislation on account of the language question; the conflicting national interests of the various states; the absence of universally recognized rules concerning the interpretation and construction of international legislation; and the impossibility of creating international legislation by a mere majority of the states.

The plan outlined for the creation of the international court provides for a Permanent Bench to be continuously in session, which will review the cases heard in the first instance by the judges appointed by the disputant states and one member from the Permanent Bench. Dr. Oppenheim expresses the belief that the experiment will be successful, provided the states are careful in the appointment of the judges and select "not diplomatists, not politicians, but only men . who have had training in law in general, and in international law in particular."

In creating the council of conciliation to pass upon political disputes, Dr. Oppenheim proposes using the foundations laid by Article 8 of the Hague Convention Concerning the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes, and the so-called Bryan Peace Treaties. His plan provides for the creation of a Permanent Council of Conciliation, with certain specified duties, composed exclusively of representatives of the Great Powers. His proposal is to have a political dispute, which cannot be settled by diplomacy, investigated and reported upon by a council composed of two national conciliators on each side and

one neutral conciliator on each side selected by the disputant states, with a chairman selected from the Permanent Council of Conciliation, which council shall, if possible, propose a settlement. No action is provided in case a settlement is not reached by mediation, beyond having copies of the report sent to each party in dispute and to the Permanent Council of Conciliation; but Dr. Oppenheim himself explains that his proposal with reference to mediation within the League of Nations is "sketchy and would need working out in detail if one were thinking of preparing a full plan for its realization."

Dr. Oppenheim emphasizes the necessity for keeping intact the independence and equality of the several states, in order to have a successful organization of a League of Nations. He, therefore, dismisses as impossible of realization, all plans for a League of Nations which, in addition to providing for an international court and council of conciliation, also provide for a federal state organization with an international executive, parliament, and army and navy, or police force. His reasons for rejecting the ideal of a federal world state organization furnish one of the most interesting discussions in the book. Among the reasons stated for this rejection are the following:

We need democracy and constitutional Government in every single State, and this can only be realised by party Government and elections of Parliament at short intervals. The waves of party strife rise high within the several States; no sooner is one party in than the other party looks out for an opening into which a wedge can be pushed to turn the Government out. In normal times this works on the whole quite well within the borders of the several States, because the interests concerned are not so widely opposed to one another that the several parties cannot alternatively govern. But when it comes to applying the same system of Government to a Federal World State, the interests at stake are too divergent. The East and the West, the South and the North, the interests of maritime States and land-locked States, the ideals and interests of industrial and agricultural States, and many other contrasts, are too great for it to be possible to govern a Federal World State by the same institutions as a State of ordinary size and composition.

This International Army and Navy would be the most powerful instrument of force which the world has ever seen, because every attempt to resist it would be futile. And the Commander of the International Army and the Commander of the International Navy would be men holding in their hands the greatest power that can be imagined.

The old question, therefore, arises: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? which I should like here to translate freely by: Who will keep in order those who are to keep the world in order? A League of Nations which can only be kept together

by a powerful International Army and Navy is a contradiction in itself; for the independence and equality of the member States of the League would soon disappear.

Dr. Oppenheim particularly warns against attempting, in the creation of a League of Nations, the realization of proposals which are "so daring and so entirely out of keeping with the historical development of International Law and the growth of the Society of Nations, that there would be great danger of the whole scheme collapsing and the whole movement coming to naught."

It is to be regretted that Dr. Oppenheim did not include in his book a draft convention for a League of Nations based upon the principles set forth in his lectures.

H. K. THOMPSON.