there is “a sensible relation between population, wealth, and industry, on the one hand, and lawsuits on the other;" and that as the large nations will have more disputes to settle, and therefore more interest in the decisions of the court, they should have a larger representation upon it. Without attempting a solution of the method of distributing the judges among the various nations, he suggests that fifteen or sixteen would be a proper number, pointing out that these judges should be so selected as to be trained in the various systems of law of the world.

Mention should also be made of the excellent paper presented by Jackson H. Ralston, esq., of the Washington bar, in which he took the strong position, supporting it by able argument, that no disputes-not even those said to involve the vital interests, honor, or independence of the nations should be reserved from arbitration.

Attention should also be called to the exceedingly able address of Judge Penfield upon international courts of justice. His paper was a comprehensive review of the history of international courts of justice and discussion of their present status and possible future.

The other addresses were by no means without interest, but, with the exception of one discussing the constitutionality of the proposed international prize court, published elsewhere in this number, they were not of a technical nature and are therefore of less interest to the readers of this JOURNAL.

The resolutions adopted by this conference show the very intelligent and advanced position which it took on several subjects. The resolutions follow:

1. We express our profound satisfaction in the long record of the United States as an advocate of international arbitration, and in the great number of cases in which it has secured an honorable settlement of serious difficulties without a resort to war. We especially commend the admirable course of our Government at the Second International Peace Conference at The Hague, and pledge our active and cordial support to every effort to fulfill the recommendations of that conference. There are no other means by which our nation can render so great a service to humanity, or do so much for the moral development and material prosperity of its own citizens.

2. The difficulties which have hitherto prevented a general agreement for the limitation of national armaments should not be permitted to obscure the plain reasonableness and imperative necessity for further efforts in that direction. Modern conditions have made it impossible for any of the leading nations to add materially to their relative military or naval strength, because every addition to the fighting force of one country leads at once to a corresponding increase in the other countries, and these secondary increases are made to serve in their turn as conclusive arguments for still greater and still more injurious and demoralizing

expenditures and efforts by all the powers. It is obvious that this self-multiplying and self-perpetuating process can end only in physical and financial exhaustion unless it can be halted by some kind of mutual understanding or agreement, and we therefore emphatically endorse the recommendation of the Hague conference that the serious study of this vital problem should be again undertaken by all the nations.

3. We strongly approve the proposal to establish an international prize court at The Hague. We realize the injustice of the present system by which neutral vessels accused of violating the laws of war are judged in the courts of the captor, and by which foreign citizens unjustly deprived of their property can seek redress only through the expensive, unsatisfactory, and wearisome method of diplomatic intervention. We welcome the proposed court not only as providing a speedy and equitable method of adjusting one class of international disputes, but as a happy augury of a more complete system of world judicature to be established in future. We believe that the United States will honor itself by providing for appeals from its courts to the international prize court, and affirming our belief in the constitutionality of the measure we urge the United States Senate to speedily ratify the convention without waiting for a world agreement relative to the laws concerning maritime captures, believing that the jurists who shall compose the court can be trusted to decide the law in such cases in full accord with the principles of "justice and equity."

4. We especially congratulate the United States delegation to The Hague upon its distinguished service in securing the recommendation of the establishment of an international court of arbitral justice in the form agreed upon "as soon as an agreement shall have been reached upon the selection of the judges and the constitution of the court." We call attention to the fact that the recommendation, naming no number of powers who must consent, leaves it open for the court to be established at The Hague so soon as three or more nations shall agree upon the method of selecting the judges. Until such a court is created to which the nations of the earth may resort with the assurance that their disputes will be judicially considered and rightly decided, resort to the law of violence will be in some cases inevitable.

We strongly urge the United States Government to take every action which it may deem expedient to secure the consent of two or more other nations to establish this great world court, believing that in this way it is now possible to render a most signal and memorable service to all mankind.

5. We urge as a matter of primary importance that there shall be a general adoption of the proposal that conferences similar to this shall be held in every State of the Union, for promoting the universal acceptance of the principles of international arbitration and the establishment of permanent courts of justice for the nations, as the only practical means to ensure the blessings of peace by making wars improbable, and ultimately impossible, in the civilized world. Such conferences will serve as the organizers and representatives of public opinion in their respective States. Their executive committees, acting together through delegates or otherwise, will exert a powerful influence in supporting the efforts of our National Government, and in other ways will promote the cause of international arbitration at home and abroad.

6. The president of this conference is hereby requested and empowered to appoint an executive committee of twenty-five, with power to add to, and to fill vacancies in, its own number. It shall be the duty of the said executive committee to act as the representative of this conference for the continuance of its work and the promotion of its objects, and for those purposes it is authorized in its discretion to confer and cooperate with other bodies or committees or individuals from any part of the United States or other countries. It is also empowered to call another meeting of this conference, or to organize a State association for similar purposes, if it shall at any time find that such action will be advisable.

THE FOURTEENTH LAKE MOHONK CONFERENCE

It will be remembered that it was at the Mohonk conference of 1905 that the first steps were taken toward the organization of the American Society of International Law and the publication of this JOURNAL. It is, therefore, an especial pleasure to the AMERICAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW to notice the meeting of the Fourteenth Lake Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration, which met at Mohonk Lake, N. Y., on May 20, 21, and 22, 1908, in response to the generous hospitality and under the wise leadership of Hon. Albert K. Smiley. The conference was large and enthusiastic. For the fourth time the Hon. John W. Foster presided over the conference with his accustomed courtesy and ability.

Among those in attendance were Justice Brewer, of the United States. Supreme Court; Chief Justice Moore, of Michigan; ex-Chief Justices Stiness and Matteson, of Rhode Island; Baron Takahira, the Japanese ambassador; Hon. James Brown Scott, Solicitor for the Department of State; Hon. John Barrett, Director of the Bureau of American Republics; Dr. Benjamin F. Trueblood, secretary of the American Peace Society; Mr. Clinton Rodgers Woodruff, secretary of the National Municipal League; Mr. Rollo Ogden, of the New York Evening Post; Mr. Hamilton Holt, of the Independent; Hon. Charles F. Manderson, of Nebraska; Hon. Thomas M. Osborne, mayor of Auburn, Public Service Commissioner of New York State; Hon. Samuel J. Barrows; Hon. Robert Lansing; Gen. Horatio C. King; Hon. W. F. Frear, Governor of Hawaii; Hon. Everett P. Wheeler; Hon. William J. Coombs; and Prof. George G. Wilson, who has been recently designated as one of the representatives of the United States at the International Maritime Conference to be held in London this fall.

The Mohonk conferences have of late years given special attention to

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arousing the interest of the educators and the business men in the cause of international arbitration, and a large number of these gentlemen were present. Many of the business men were especially designated as representatives by leading commercial bodies of the country, while among the educators - besides the Hon. Elmer E. Brown, United States Commissioner of Education, and Dr. Andrew S. Draper, New York Commissioner of Education - Columbia University, Johns Hopkins University, New York University, Cincinnati University, Brown University, University of Georgia, George Washington University, and Smith, Bryn Mawr, Lafayette, Swarthmore, and Vassar colleges were represented by one or more members of their respective faculties.

The first session of the Mohonk conference is always devoted to a recounting of the achievements of the past year along the line of international arbitration, and this year the conference had much to recount. Mr. Smiley, in his brief opening address, struck the keynote of the conference when he referred to the work of the Second Hague Conference as worthy of high praise even when tested by the standard of the expectations which had been entertained by the members of the last Mohonk conference which met just prior to the meeting at The Hague, as expressed in the platform then adopted.

General Foster and Dr. Trueblood gave interesting and inspiring addresses devoted to a general survey of the progress of arbitration during the past year, and the session was closed with an address by the Hon. James Brown Scott, a member of the American delegation to the Second Hague Conference, who rendered an account of his stewardship by giving a careful analysis of the results of the Hague Conference. Altogether it was a notable session.

Space forbids even a mention of the many other excellent addresses delivered at other sessions of the conference. No account of the conference would be complete, however, without reference to the address of Dean Kirchwey, of Columbia University, on "International Law and the World's Peace," in which he drew the parallel between private and public war, the court for the individual and the international tribunal for the nation; and the address of Rollo Ogden, editor of the New York Evening Post, on the relations of the press to the cause of international arbitration. The conference was also honored by communications from Ambassador Bryce and Minister Calvo, of Costa Rica, which were read to the conference.

It has always been the aim of Mr. Smiley that the Mohonk conferences

should be practical as well as prophetic, or, in the language of one of the members of the present conference, "should be as a man who, while looking above the clouds, still keeps his feet upon the ground."

It is as inevitable as it is desirable in a gathering of this character that there should be differences of opinion, and it has always been Mr. Smiley's desire that these divergent views should be freely expressed in the conference. It has, however, been the policy of the conference only to embody those principles in the platform upon which a unanimous agreement could be reached, inasmuch as it has been believed that in this way the influence of the conference would be greatest and it would be best able to maintain the continued interest and adhesion of a large number of valuable and practical members.

This policy was followed at this year's conference, and occasioned the only criticism of the conference which we have seen expressed, to the effect that the platform adopted "was too retrospective. It dealt almost exclusively with what has been accomplished and gave no real lead, except by implication, as to what should be further done." This criticism arises out of the treatment of the subject of the limitation of armaments in the platform.

As is well known, it was found impossible to accomplish any practical result at the Hague Conference as regards the limitation of armaments, the conference being forced to content itself with remitting the matter to the powers for further study. Under these circumstances it seemed to many, although probably a minority, of those in attendance at Mohonk that it would be not only useless but undesirable for the conference to express any opinion in favor of the limitation of armaments in its platform at the present time. And to this opinion others, like Justice Brewer, who moved the adoption of the platform, although he would have preferred to see it contain some expression in regard to the limitation of armaments, yielded their wishes in order that the platform might be adopted unanimously. Still others, however, felt so strongly that the platform should contain some indorsement of the gradual and progressive limitation of armament that it was moved on the floor of the conference to recommit the platform to the committee which had prepared it in order that a declaration in this sense might be inserted. This motion would have undoubtedly precipitated a lively debate and the result of any vote which might have been taken would have been in doubt but for the fact that the motion was withdrawn in deference to Mr. Smiley's wish that no action might be taken in regard to a matter