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of Nations

By ROBERT D. LEIGH, Instructor in Government, Reed College

The general movement for a league of nations has gained from the varying emphases put upon different parts of it by specialists. Beneath a wholesome external unity of program there is discernible the political scientist and the lawyer who have the conviction that the essential factor in guaranteeing peace is international governing machinery, the economist who pins his faith on freedom of trade and capital investment, the historian who insists that a scientific geographical settlement is a sine qua non, and the war statesman who is sure that all depends upon defeating the "Huns"; not to mention other less considerable groups whose angles of vision lead them to stress such features as universal disarmament or armed isolation, and therefore can not be brought in under the general leagueof-nations program.

The political probabilities are that the peace conference after the war, because it will represent political amalgamation instead of particular lines of thought cleavage, will be both a synthesis and a compromise. It will be a partial fulfilment of the insistences of all important groups and a complete satisfaction to no one of them. The great merit of the American League to Enforce Peace is that it furnishes such a synthesis and such a compromise. It is a practical platform, not a Utopia. The program of the war-statesmen and political scientists, consisting of the defeat of autocracy and international machinery, seems, however, to be receiving the greatest public sanction. It is well for the success of the general project that this is so. Public opinion, in the United States at least, is inclined by the traditions of its own domestic struggles toward the idea of democracy and a supreme court whose decrees settle important political disputes. The economic causes and cures for war are not so attractive. Solutions of international frictions typified by the Bagdad railway, Morocco, Irredentism, Constantinople and Trieste smack too much of the counting-house to serve as a part of a war-to-end-war program. The "war of steel

and gold" pales beside "vindicating the national honor" or "making the world safe for democracy."

We may reasonably hope that much will be accomplished in the carrying out of the more popular parts of the league program at the end of the war. We may safely count on the establishment of some international league among a group of democratic nations. We may expect with some confidence that a substantial beginning will be made toward the limitation of armaments and a scientific boundary adjustment. But judging from the present "set" of the public mind there is much less probability that there will be an immediate solution of the economic frictions which lead to war, of the problems of freedom of trade, and of investment of capital in backward countries. Indeed these, as well as boundary settlements and psychological considerations, can not be disposed of at any one time. Guarantee of peace in such concerns can come only through continuous change of status, through adjustment, experiment and revision.

A part of our planning, then, should be for a regularly constituted means of peaceable change of status. This is foreshadowed in the council of conciliation and legislative conferences of the American plan. But something must be provided to give continuity and consistency to the changes. In other words, we should look ahead to a parliamentary as well as a constitutional program. It is by a liberal voting majority in some representative establishment that we can hope to work out the complex problems of an economic and psychological nature. This modest evolutionary method is not urged because these latter problems are unimportant, but because they are at present under-advertised. And programs of permanent peace can no longer afford to overlook such factors as political psychology. As long as these points of strain remain unrelieved there is bound to be international friction and perhaps war. But relief will, in all likelihood, be a gradual process.

An outline for a liberal party, then, not a set of principles to be unanimously adopted at the conference, is here proposed. It was suggested by the New Republic reviewer of Beer's English-Speaking Peoples than an Anglo-American alliance would naturally become such a liberalizing party. This may be the

turn of events, although the exalting of Anglo-Saxondom as a racial culture possessing special attributes of democracy is an invidious distinction in international politics. It is assumed, however, that the United States would be a member of any liberalizing group in an international polity.

A liberal party platform should contain at least three cardinal principles: free and equal opportunity of commercial intercourse and investment, the adoption of the federal idea of divided sovereignty and local autonomy, and the control of military establishments by international legality.

1. Free and equal opportunity for commercial intercourse and investment.

This means freedom of the seas in time of peace, equalized opportunity for all nations to get from their borders to seaports, a fair opportunity for transshipment at seaports, investment of capital on equal terms in backward countries, and, finally, equality of tariffs between nations and between one nation and the colonial possessions of other nations. Such a program is impossible of immediate accomplishment, but it is inherently consistent and can surround itself with valuable traditions of allegiance.

The first item, the freedom of the seas, we have already attained in time of peace. It remains to guarantee freedom to neutrals in time of war. The second item, equality of opportunity in getting goods from national borders to the ships is, on the other hand, a very perplexing problem. It is the problem of Russia and Constantinople, Poland and the Vistula, Middle Europe and Trieste. To propose a geographical settlement that will give every European state surviving the war a seaport under its own sovereignty is an absurdity. Such a map would be an impossibility. The only alternative is the creation of free ports, or international control of important ports, and an endless series of agreements and compromises between neighboring states with regard to railway rates and canal tolls. Such arrangement will take time and a will to persist. These can best be furnished by a powerful parliamentary group pledged to the general principle of equality of national maritime opportunity.

The competition of investors of capital in backward countries where high rates of interest can be secured is a constant danger zone in international relationships. A solution must be evolved; it can not be suddenly decreed. The only method of adjustment which has received any considerable support is an international joint control of particular investment areas. Such individual and particular adjustments can be brought about most effectively by a permanent international partyprogram.

Of all these planks to the economic readjustment program, free trade, or the universal application of the favored nation clause between nations, seems furthest from practical accomplishment. But it is by no means unimportant as a peacepreserving policy. Free interchange of goods between states in the industrial economy is a sound theory, no matter how often it may be denied in practice. Exports and imports unhampered by discriminating tariffs are as desirable for national welfare and economy as machinery and other divisions of labor. The idea of building up an economically self-sufficing unit as a preparedness measure (the most valuable protective tariff argument before the war, internationally considered') would under any league of nations be extended to include the new international military unit. The plan drawn up at the Paris economic conference is a practical recognition of the enlargement of the self-sufficient unity. But by its exclusion of neutrals and enemies from the benefits of the most-favored nation treatment, and thus, from an equal opportunity in the world's markets, this same economic program is exceedingly dangerous for the future peace of the world. This might not be so, however, if the membership in such a league were opened to all who desired to maintain its program. But as Canning said many years ago, free trade is a truly pacific policy. Nations. whose markets are restricted are bound to be nations with a grievance, and national self-interest and welfare-even of recent enemies can not be ignored in a comprehensive policy for guaranteeing peace. Here again the political psychology of the present seems to indicate that this policy will be gradually evolved in future international congresses, not made by fiat at the end of the war.

2. The adoption of the federal principle of divided sovereignty and local autonomy.

Any prolonged study of political tendencies leads one to the inevitable conclusion that international government, the maintenance of international machinery with anything more than a shadow of effectiveness, necessitates a giving up of the idea of indivisible national sovereignty. This theory, while it is the orthodox view in political science, has never been actually carried out in practice to any great extent. The United States, with its state and national governments, and the British empire, with its autonomous colonies, have built up the opposite notion of sanction of a divided allegiance, of divided sovereignty. The disintegration of smaller sovereignties in favor of larger ones is always both a painful and a gradual process. Whether we must definitely recognize international sovereignty and depend on the self-control involved in the idea of local autonomy, or whether we may retain our national sovereignty with little impairment and create a voluntary international cooperation in matters of enforcement, it is idle to predict. Some disintegration of "indivisible" nationality we may hope for in the peace settlement, but the creation of a satisfactory working arrangement must be entrusted to a liberal group of nations who will revise and readjust the division of powers until a permanent result is attained.

3. The control of military establishments by international legal agreements.

The inclusion of this third great principle as a part of the parliamentary program, rather than a part of the constitutional arrangement at the peace conference, is another way of saying that the reduction of armament must be gradual. The only way we can assure ourselves, however, that this reduction will keep pace with decreased opposition from without is by the maintenance of a party with the tradition of constant watchfulness, a party alert enough to offset the inertia of the status quo.

Officially, at least, our present conflict is a truly pacifist affair the war to end war. But in carrying it on the whole military program, with universal service and large munition plants, must be adopted. Will it be an easy matter to do away

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