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consular officer of the United States, under such rules and regulations as the department of state shall prescribe: and provided also, that no American citizen shall be allowed to expatriate himself when this country is at war.

5. That every male child being an American citizen resident abroad who desires to enjoy the protection of this government be required upon reaching the age of eighteen years to record at the most convenient American consulate his intention to become a resident and remain a citizen of the United States, and to take the oath of allegiance upon attaining his majority; and that an American citizen residing continuously outside of the United States for more than one year be required to register in a similar manner, at least once each year, his name and place of residence, date and place of birth, nationality of parents, occupation, and last place of residence in the United States, and to give solemn assurance of his continued allegiance to the United States and of his intention to return thereto. Section 6 of the act of March 2, 1907, passed in pursuance of this recommendation, provides:

That all children born outside the limits of the United States who are citizens thereof in accordance with the provisions of §1993 of the Revised Statutes of the United States and who continue to reside outside the United States shall, in order to receive the protection of this government, be required upon reaching the age of eighteen years to record at an American consulate their intention to become residents and remain citizens of the United States and shall be further required to take the oath of allegiance to the United States upon attaining their majority.

It will be noticed that the application of this provision of the law is confined to children born outside the United States, thus showing that congress intended to differentiate, in this respect, between those born abroad and those born in the United States.

6. That the secretary of state be authorized, under such rules and regulations as the president shall prescribe, to extend the protection of this government and to issue qualified passports to those who, have made the declaration of intention to become citizens of the United States in accordance with the requirements of the act approved June 29, 1906, and who go abroad for brief sojourn, such protection and passports not to be effective in the country of the origin of the declarants and not to be granted to those who have resided in the United States for a period of less than three years. This recommendation was enacted into law (§1, act of March 2, 1907), in this language:

The secretary of state shall be authorized in his discretion, to issue passports to persons not citizens of the United States as follows: Where any person has made a declaration of intention to become a citizen of the United States as provided by law and has resided in the United States for three years, a passport may be issued

to him entitling him to the protection of the government in any foreign country: provided, that such passport shall not be valid for more than six months and shall not be renewed, and that such passport shall not entitle the holder to the protection of this government in the country of which he was a citizen prior to making such declaration of intention.

This provision, qualified and limited, as it is, may serve a useful purpose. The only question that could properly be raised with reference to it, is as to the right of this government to intervene to protect, in a country not of declarant's origin, one who is not a citizen of the United States.

The recommendation of the board that the secretary of state be authorized to issue certificates of nativity to natural-born citizens of the United States, temporarily resident abroad, or who intend temporarily to reside abroad for legitimate purposes, setting forth the place of their origin, date of birth, and place of permanent residence in the United States, which was designed to meet an actual local requirement for purposes of identification, failed of enacment into law.

The further recommendations that, in order to prevent abuse of American passports in foreign countries, it be ordered that in future all passports shall be issued only by the department of state, to be valid for two years, and subject to a single extension for a like additional period by diplomatic and certain consular officers of the United States; and that the diplomatic officers of the United States be instructed to open negotiations with the governments to which they are accredited, extending and perfecting the treaty relations of the United States with respect to the rights of Americans, in order to secure to our citizens rights and privileges in accordance with the recommendations of the board; will, it is understood, be carried into effect by executive action.

The report of this board, remarkable both on account of its comprehensiveness and the fact that so many of its recommendations were so soon written into law, is highly creditable alike to the able gentlemen who were responsible for its preparation, and to the department under which they serve.

FREDERICK VAN DYNE.

Die Kodifikation des Automobilrechts. By Dr. Fr. Meili, Professor in the University of Zurich. Vienna; Mansche Hof-Verlags. iv, pp. 188. 1907.

Automobile Regulations of France and Other Countries. By H. Cleveland Coxe, Deputy Consul General of the United States at Paris. Paris and New York: Bretano. pp. 82. 1906.

Mr. Coxe, in his useful and carefully prepared book, happily applies the adjective "nomadic" to that new vehicle which we, in common with the greater part of the world, call the "automobile." The appearance on the highways of the world of this mechanical nomad, which will in all likelihood have crossed the border from another state or nation a few hours previously and whose occupants may be foreigners bound for some distant state or nation, raises questions concerning the need of uniformity in the rules governing highway traffic analogous to those which arise out of sea traffic. Consequently, Mr. Coxe finds it necessary to include the automobile regulations of other countries along with those of France. The British royal commission on motor cars, which made its report in 1906, includes a survey of the automobile regulations of Europe, as a part of the basis of its recommendations; and Dr. Meili codifies all the existing regulations of this country and Europe (using Mr. X. T. Huddy's recent American book on The Law of Automobiles as his American source), and draws conclusions concerning the interstate and international action necessary to control this mechanical nomad and make it beneficent.

From the books above mentioned the following definition of an "automobile" in this technical sense-the nomadic automobile-may be derived: It is a machine which accomplishes locomotion on the land, by means of a power stored or generated within itself, without the aid of any structure attached to the land, and which is of such size, weight, resiliency and compactness as to be capable of carrying persons comfortably and things securely for long distances at high speed, without injury to persons, things, or road surfaces and without injury to itself, by means of a source of power universally and cheaply to be obtained and easily to be carried.

An examination of the documents referred to in the books above named, shows that automobile machines not conforming to these requirements tend more and more to be classified under special names other than "automobile." In Great Britain there appears to be a tendency to apply the term "motor car" solely to the nomadic automobile, although in existing legislation it has a wider sense.

All the writers in considering the question of regulation of automobiles,

necessarily treat of the prevention of injury by inspection of machinery and equipment, by examination of operators, and by passports, of civil remedies for injury to person or property, of criminal punishment for violation of law and of taxation. The codification made by Dr. Meili of existing regulations on all these subjects is very complete. At the end of his book, Dr. Meili takes up the international questions arising out of the nomadic character of the machine. His conclusions concerning the action necessary to be taken in the interests both of the automobilists and the public are as follows (pp. 183-185):

The action which is first and most urgently required is, to formulate a uniform law concerning the operation of automobiles, defining the rights and duties of public officials and private persons in this respect. Everywhere the public and the automobilists are alike interested in having that done which will render life and property secure, and it ought not to be impossible to bring about such action as is necessary to accomplish this object; that is, to agree concerning proper requirements concerning construction and equipment to be complied with before permission to operate the machine can be granted, concerning the rules of the road, concerning signs and signals and concerning the manner of ascertaining the qualifications of those who wish to operate automobiles. These are matters regarding which, diversity of regulation becomes more and more unendurable. On these subjects it is possible to develop a unity of sentiment, because necessity compels all the diversely affected interests to concur in these respects for the common safety, and because it is necessary that there should be an agreement in these respects in order that the automobile may perform beneficent functions to the community at large.

The second action necessary is to determine the status of the automobile in international law, as a basis for reasoning with respect to those matters which cannot now be agreed upon.

The third and final stage of the worry will consist in determining the juridical status of the automobile and the special duties and liabilities growing out of the ownership and operation of the machine. Local legislation will be ineffective until there is a general agreement on principles. The states and nations must unite on a standard of legislative action respecting automobiles as the only means of avoiding legislation founded on wholly diverse principles. In the nature of the case, there is no possibility of framing an automobile law from a strictly national standpoint.

Of the correctness of Dr. Meili's conclusions there can, it would seem, be no doubt. The possibility of there appearing at any time upon any highway in the world a powerful and rapidly moving vehicle owned and operated by persons foreign to the region, necessitates, for the safety of all concerned, a standard of safe construction and equipment for such vehicles, and a mutual understanding on the part of all concerned respecting rules of the road, signs and signals, so that all concerned may, in every emergency, have an instantaneous and almost instinctive perception of their respective rights and duties, and may act accordingly. Such uniform precautionary measures and such uniform rules and standards can of course only be established by interstate and interna

tional agreements, which would however, in many cases require to be adopted or carried into effect by legislation.

ALPHEUS HENRY SNOW.

A History of Diplomacy in the International Development of Europe. By David Jayne Hill, LL.D. Vol. ii.

The Establishment of Territorial Sovereignty. With maps and tables. Longmans, Green & Co. 1907.

To judge a work fairly one must get the author's point of view. This is true in all art. We must stand with the artist and get a true understanding of the spiritual truth he intended to portray. One may differ with the principle, may deny the correctness of the conception, but it remains true that to be fair one must accept the theory of the author and then say whether in his work he has clearly and strongly presented and fairly attained his ideal. And so in estimating this literary work we take the author's standpoint, accept his statement of the task he set before himself, and try to determine whether the object has been attained.

Doctor Hill in his second volume of the History of European Diplomacy says that it is to be

an account of the political development of Europe regarded from the international point of view, in which the emphasis is laid upon diplomatic policy and action rather than upon military operations.

The reader is then warned to divest himself of the present day conception of diplomacy as having "the modern accessories of organized chancelleries and permanent missions," and look for the "essence of diplomacy as seen in the intellectual and spiritual forces represented in plans and and purposes and policies of nations," developed and made prevalent through the issue of all agencies, even armies and navies, to accomplish designed results. He deals with the psychological factors "in moments of creative action" and not with the mere history of military conflicts which may or may not have been the agencies employed to bring about the result intended by men of great spiritual force. These men, who were real diplomatists, did not, perhaps, wear the straps and spangles of military heroes, nor bear arms upon bloody battle fields; their weapons were ideas, and they won supremacy

by skillfully acting upon the faith, hopes, fears, affections, and ideals of mankind and through constancy to imperial ideas brought states and empires into being and power. The volume is entitled, The Establishment of Terri

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