A.—sc

encountered by a Government in giving effeit to an award pronounced by an arbitral body on a matter which public sentiment considers to be of paramount and vital importance. The present system as laid down in the Covenant, which furnishes an alternative procedure, does appear, however, to have very evident advantages in elasticity and adaptation to the existing state of public opinion over the proposed machinery of compulsory arbitration. There exist at the present time other very serious practical objections to the adoption of compulsory arbitration as a general system. To be effective, compulsory arbitration must secure the consent of all countries between which disputes may conceivably arise. To establish a general system of compulsory arbitration to which any powerful States are not parties cannot fail to be a source of danger both to the successful carrying-out of the system itself and to the international organization under which it operates. It has been a matter of grave concern always to the Commonwealth Government that certain of the foremost nations of the world have not yet become members of the League of Nations, thus accepting the international obligations which are contained in the Covenant and lending their authority for the preservation of peace, this position throwing heavier obligations on the member States than were originally contemplated when the Covenant of the League was agreed to. It is, therefore, considered that the progressive incorporation of those nations in the League should precede and not follow the assumption of greater obligations that the Protocol will impose upon member States. This reason alone is considered by the Commonwealth Government as amply sufficient to render premature any endeavour at the present time to generalize the principle of compulsory arbitration. Articles 10 and 11 of the Protocol, which are regarded as complementary to the provisions respecting compulsory arbitration, while possessing some features that could with advantage be incorporated into the Covenant would also introduce novel, and in some respects, it is believed, undesirable, elements into the constitution of the League. These Articles accentuate very considerably the coercive provisions of the League's Charter. It is felt further that these provisions, while not actually converting the League into a super State, would tend to deflect that organization from being a powerful moral agency for the moulding of the world's opinion in the direction of peaceful and healthy international relations to being an organization for the imposition of pains and penalties. As the foregoing observations touch the main principles on which the Protocol is based, little would appear to be gained by a detailed examination of the subsidiary provisions. Several of the latter, however, may be briefly referred to. Article 10 of the Protocol defines the circumstances in which certain presumptions of aggression arise against a State, and provides that, " in the event of hostilities having broken out, any State shall be presumed to be an aggressor unless a decision of the Council, which must be taken unanimously, shall otherwise declare (1) if it has . . . disregarded a unanimous report of the Council, a judicial sentence, or an arbitral award recognizing that the dispute between it and the other belligerent State arises out of a matter which by international law is solely within the domestic jurisdiction of the latter State, nevertheless in the last case the State shall only be presumed to be an aggressor if it has not previously submitted the question to the Council or Assembly in accordance with Article 11 of the Covenant . . ." It does not appear that any logical reason can be advanced to justify an award declaring that a dispute arising from a matter of domestic jurisdiction should be placed on a different footing from any other arbitral award or a unanimous decision of the Council. When a State commits an act of war against another State concerning a matter which International Law declares to be one of purely domestic jurisdiction, it is obviously not in the interests of good understanding between Nations that such an act of aggression, constituting, as it does, an International crime, should be covered by some special proviso. And this is particularly so as under Article 11 of the Covenant any dispute assuming the character of a war, or a threat of war, is a matter of concern to the whole League. The proviso of Article 10 (1) is, therefore, unacceptable to the Commonwealth Government. Article 10 also provides that if the Council does not at once succeed in determining the aggressor, it shall enjoin upon the belligerents an armistice fixing the terms thereof, and any belligerent which refuses to accept armistice, or which has violated terms, shall be deemed an aggressor. To give effect to this provision, which is one of capital importance, it would be indispensable for the League to possess organic control on the spot. This would present certain difficulties in a theatre relatively near to the centre of activity; in a remote theatre it is feared that to establish which party, violated the terms of an armistice (fixed at the commencement of hostilities) would present in practice exceptional, if not insuperable, difficulties, and thus be impossible of carrying out. From above considerations it will be seen that the Commonwealth Government is of opinion that the Protocol contains principles and provisions which do not at present appear to be applicable to the present situation of International life. It is also believed that any endeavours to amend the Protocol so as to give effect to objections that have been raised would present but little practical utility, as these objections cut through the essential principles on which the whole reposes. But this does not imply that the prolonged efforts of which the Protocol is the outcome have been spent in vain. No serious attempt to evolve methods of preserving International peace can be considered as fruitless. The gradual strengthening of the Covenant in these directions where it reveals weakness should be, and doubtless is, the aim of all member States. Such a method seems to be preferable to that of recasting the whole principle on which the present constitution of the League is based, and the Commonwealth Government will gladly and sincerely co-operate along such lines.

2—A. sc.

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