INTEKNATIONAL EEFOEM. By the same Author. THE OXFORD REFORMERS, JOHN COLET, ERASMUS, and THOMAS MORE. Being a History of their Fellow-work. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. Price 14s. IOW CAN COMPULSORY EDUCATION BE MADE TO WORK IN ENGLAND? Reprinted, with Alterations, from the Fortnightly Review. Priced. INTERNATIONAL REFORM. BV FREDERIC SEEBOHM. LONDON : LONGMANS, GEEEN, AND CO. 1871. LONDON: PEINTBD BT WOTTJSWOODB AND CO.. NBW-STBBBT SQUIBB AND PAELIAMBNT SIBEET PREFACE. THIS ESSAY was written during the American Civil War, and was in part printed at the time for private circulation only. I have been induced to publish it at this juncture, in the hope that a calm statement of the economic argument in favour of In- ternational Reform may obtain an impartial hearing at a time when the public mind is in some danger of being drawn off the true scent by the cry for increased armaments and the abandonment of the principle of non-intervention. I have added a Postscript on the relation of the reform advocated in the Essay to the policy of non-intervention so earnestly advo- cated by the late Mr. Cobden. F. S. HITCHIN: February 1871. 20178C6 CONTENTS. PART I. ON THE TENDENCY OF MODERN INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY TOWARDS THE INCREASED INTERDEPENDENCE OF NATIONS . Page 1 PART II. ON THE INADEQUACY OF THE PRESENT INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM AND IN WHAT IT CONSISTS Page 61 PART in. ON THE NATURE OF THE INTERNATIONAL REFORM REQUIRED BY THE INCREASING INTERDEPENDENCE OF NATIONS : 1. IN INTERNATIONAL LAW. 2. IN ITS INTERPRETATION. 3. IN ITS ENFORCEMENT. Page 95 POSTSCRIPT ON THE RELATION OF THE REFORM ADVOCATED IN THIS ESSAY TO THE POLICY OF NON-INTERVENTION URGED BY THE LATE MR. COBDEN ..... Page 143 B 2 PART I. ON THE TENDENCY OF MODERN INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY TOWARDS THE INCREASED INTERDEPENDENCE OF NATIONS. CHAPTER I. * I. ON THE LAWS OF NATURE REGULATING INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY. PRACTICAL MEN shrink from having anything to do with whatever will not work. Taught by experience, they have learned to re- cognise the existence of facts so firmly fixed in the constitution of things by nature, that for want of a clearer- term we call them laws of nature. And all thinking men are agreed that nothing which clashes with these laws does or can work; while everything which does or will work must do so by using and obeying the laws of nature, by acting in concert with them, and in no wise against them. This faith of practical men in the laws of nature, and utter distrust of everything which clashes, or is supposed to clash, with them, is not confined to the laws embraced in the physical sciences only. With increasing knowledge the current of modern thought has set in with increasing force in favour of entire and implicit faith in all laws of nature, including those embraced in political science. As surely as the engineer knows that, unless he construct his bridge in accordance with the laws 4 On International Reform. of mechanical science it will not stand, so surely does the merchant, in planning a trade transaction, or the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in framing a budget, know that the one or the other will succeed only so far as it is in strict accordance with the laws of political economy. Monopolies and pro- tective duties, statutes of wages, and a hundred other things which were found to clash with these laws, have one after another been wisely swept away like cobwebs to the domain of the moles and bats. Now, using the term ' laws of nature ' in this sense strictly, and in no looser one, if it be really proved that such and such reforms are required to bring the present international system into har- mony with the facts and laws of nature in points in which it now clashes with them, and conse- quently does not work, it will be seen at once that these reforms are required by something far more inexorable than the ' Lex Naturae ' of the Jurists that, in fact, they are steps in the great march of civilisation which, the world and the human race being constituted as they are, must inevitably be taken, unless we prefer that human progress should halt on its career. Interdependence of Nations. II. THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF NATIONS NOT OPTIONAL BUT BY LAW OF NATURE. HAVING, in the previous section, clearly denned what we mean by laws of nature, the reader's at- tention is called to the fact that, as it is by law of nature, and not merely by human contrivance, that men are led to become socially connected and in- terdependent, so it is by law of nature, and not merely by human contrivance, that nations are led to maintain international intercourse and to become more or less dependent one on another. Each country might have been endowed with a similar climate and soil. The air might have been made to fill only the valleys as the sea does now. In a thousand other ways each nation might have been made self-subsistent, and as effectually barred out from intercourse with every other as if each had been a separate world. But the world, as it is, with its arctic, temperate, and torrid zones, its varied soils and natural productions, its iron and coal beds lying in one zone, its cotton growing only in another the world, as it is, with its na- tions of different habits and different races, sepa- rated by difference of language, but not cut off altogether the one from the other, because both capacity and inducement have been given, as they increase in knowledge and skill, more and more to bridge over the straits between them the world, 6 On International Reform. as it z's, is so framed as, instead of keeping nations isolated and separate, to compel them, as they advance in civilisation, more and more to weave the web of intercourse to entangle, as it were, the threads of their national prosperity into an international skein. Experience has taught us that if a nation choose to act selfishly and, by corn laws or anything else, unduly to check interna- national intercourse and interchange of wealth, it will thereby inevitably lessen its own selfish share of the comforts of life. And clearly it is not merely by human contrivance, or by any human law, but by law of nature that it is so. III. ON. THE LAWS BY WHICH THE DEGREE OF INTER- NATIONAL DEPENDENCE IS DETERMINED. BUT while all nations are by law of nature made more or less dependent upon international inter- course, obviously the degree in which they are de- pendent differs materially. Nations may, in this respect, be regarded as roughly divisible into three groups or classes : 1st. Those thinly peopled, exporting natural produce, and importing manufactures arid luxuries. 2nd. Those well peopled, consuming their own produce, and manufacturing their own goods. Interdependence of Nations. 7 3rd. Those densely peopled, exporting manufac- tures and luxuries, and importing natural produce. And these three classes may be said to represent three stages in a nation's history. Nations in their youth have almost always passed through the first or youthful stage ; many have passed from it into the second, or self-subsistent stage ; and a few pioneer nations have passed on through this middle stage into the third, or most dependent stage. But it is not a matter of a nation's own choice altogether in which of these stages it shall perma- nently remain. This question also is determined, not merely by national will or the contrivance of governments, but by certain laws of nature ; under these laws nations are indeed free to take what course they may choose, but they cannot rid them- selves of them. They may act in opposition to what by those laws is their own true interest, but whether they do so through ignorance or folly, it will be at the cost of abridged prosperity and often of actual suffering. It is not denied that nations may continue in the self-subsistent stage for long periods of history under certain peculiar circumstances. But it is sub- mitted that a careful review of the facts of modern history may enable us to point out with something of certainty what those peculiar circumstances are under which alone nations can remain for long in 8 On International Reform. the self-subsistent stage of national life, and to judge whether those circumstances, as a matter of fact, do now or are likely in the future to exist. Thus it may be regarded as a fact established by political economists, that unless a nation's own economic condition be such as to keep down its population within limits proportioned to the limits of its land, one of two results is certain to follow sooner or later; either it will have to suffer the miseries and hardships of over-population, or it will have to expand itself, and pass on into the third stage of national existence. If it is to remain for long in the self-subsistent stage of national life, the prosperity and comfort of its people is dependent upon the existence of a powerful check upon the increase of population. Now, putting aside the check which a very high moral condition and standard of comfort in a people would produce, as a thing which, however much to be desired and striven after, does not operate in any but the highest stages of civilisation ; and look- ing at the facts of the case as they now are and for some time are likely to be, it appears to be estab- lished further that in a state of society in which men as they grow up can most readily marry and put themselves into a similar position to that of others around them as when the whole population are detached from the land and work for weekly wages population is most likely to increase rapidly, because there is the least check upon its increase. Interdependence of Nations. 9 But that in a state of society in which there are obstacles to early marriage, and men must wait till they have saved money or inherited the position of others before they can marry and place themselves in a similar position to those around them as e. g. in a state of peasant proprietorship population will remain most nearly stationary, because there will be the greatest check upon its increase. Thus if the peasantry of a nation have emerged out of feudal serfdom into peasant proprietorship, and at the same time the proportion of town and trading population to the country population is small, you have a nation in which the population may well remain nearly stationary and the nation itself remain for a long period in the second or self-subsistent stage of national existence. While, should it have chanced that from any cause the proportion of town to country population is large, and at the same time the peasantry have not emerged out of feudal serfdom into peasant pro- prietorship, but have become detached from the soil and work at their own free will for weekly wages, you have a nation probably destined to in- crease rapidly in population, and which, if new channels of employment are not opened out as fast as population increases, will suffer the evils of over- population in all their force. If new channels of occupation are opened out as population increases, such a nation will quickly outgrow the limits of its land, and its prosperity will become more and more 10 On International Reform. rapidly dependent upon free international inter- course. . In fact such a nation will be compelled to pass through the second stage' into the third or most dependent one unless there be actual barriers against international intercourse strong enough to prevent it. If there be effectual barriers against international intercourse, whatever their nature, nations will of course be forced at all costs to enter and remain in the self-subsistent state suffering less or more according as the physical character of their country, and their own economic condition, favour a policy of self- subsistence or otherwise. But inasmuch as these barriers, in the long run, inflict suffering and are removable, their removal is only a question of time. When the suffering is sufficiently keenly felt, nations will rise and break through them. They are not barriers placed by law of nature, irrevocably fixed they are green withes which a Samson rising in his strength may shake off. As a matter of fact these barriers are fast melt- ing away. Commercial treaties and the spread of Free Trade doctrines are steadily doing their work. And the result is that, as years roll on, the ques- tion of how long the great nations can continue in the self-subsistent stage of national life of how soon they will be constrained to follow the steps of the Interdependence of Nations. 11 pioneer nations into the most dependent stage is becoming more and more an economic question for each nation to answer according to its own econo- mic condition. And the future of nations in this respect is therefore becoming more and more dependent upon causes having their root often far back in the past and less and less within the range of a nation's present choice or control. It is believed that the rapid, but not necessarily on that account superficial, review of the actual facts of modern economic history contained in the following chapter, will not only illustrate, so far as is needful for the present purpose, the cor- rectness of these general principles, but also leave no doubt on the mind of the reader as to what, under existing laws of nature, is the actual and inevitable tendency of modern international society. 12 CHAPTER II. I. INTRODUCTORY. WHAT is 'the tendency of modern International Society ? Are civilised nations likely to plod on as most of them have done for the past five cen- turies in the self-subsistent state ? Or are they inevitably drifting towards a condition of greater and greater dependence on international inter- course ? It has been stated that in proportion as the barriers to free international intercourse give way before increasing intelligence, the answer to this question is more and more to be sought rather in the economic condition of the nations themselves than in the direct intention and policy of their rulers. It is accordingly proposed in this chapter to pass in review the economic history and condition of modern nations. And as it may be convenient to do so in the order of their present dependence on international commerce, it is proposed to take the case: 1st. Of those nations which have already entered the ' most dependent ' stage of national life. Interdependence of Nations. 13 2nd. Of those in the ' self-subsistent ' stage ; and 3rd. Of those in the l youthful J stage. Taking the double test afforded, first, by the proportion of the annual exports and imports of a country to the number of its inhabitants; and secondly, by the proportion of its population to the extent of its territory, it will not be difficult to separate them with sufficient accuracy "into three groups. Relying on the valuable information contained in 'Puissance comparee des divers Etats de 1' Europe, par Maurice Block, Gotha, 1862,' the following classification may fairly be adopted : Annual Value of Imports and Exports per head of the Population per Population square Kilograms | (Holland ... 12.8 ... 107 fl | J Great Britain ... 11.3 ... 93 iff 1 Switzerland ... 10.0 ... 61 |f [Belgium ... 7.3 ... 158 The above nations are dependent most years on foreign supplies of food. ' France ... 4.2 ... 68 Italy ... ... 95 Zollverein ... 3.4 ... 64 to 74 Denmark ... 3.2 ... 44 Greece ... 2. ... 22 Sweden I Lg ? ?? Norway j Spain ... 1.4 ... 31 Austria ... 1.4 ... 54 Portugal ... 0.9 ... 39 Russia ... 0.8 ... 12 . Turkey ... ? ... 17 gj, I The United States; Brazil, and the South American < [_ Republics, British Colonies, &c., &c. C 14 On International Reform. Finally, to these three groups or classes may be added another embracing the more or less un- civilised nations : China, Japan, &c., which require some consideration, owing to the intimate connexion growing up between them and civilised nations. II. ON THE MOST DEPENDENT NATIONS GENERALLY THEIR TENACITY OF LIFE. CONFINING our attention at present to the most dependent nations, it may be well to make a few general remarks before passing to the consideration of the case of each nation in particular. With respect to these nations, the great point to be ascertained will be whether their dependence on international trade is likely to be permanent. It has often been remarked how precarious a foundation of permanent prosperity a dependence on international commerce has, in the course of history, proved itself to be. And many a lesson has been read to modern nations on this text. But it may well be questioned whether, text and context taken together, such really is the lesson to be learned from history. So far as I can gather the thread of its teaching, it is precisely the re- verse. Tyre, Venice, Genoa, have doubtless left us Interdependence of Nations. 15 the lesson of their fall. But the discovery of the passage round the Cape of Good Hope in itself affords too good a reason for a great decline of Mediterranean trade to make the case of these cities a representative one. Setting aside this exceptional case of the Mediterranean ports, the great fact to be learned from the commercial history of the past five centuries I conceive to be the tenacity of life, if I may so speak, exhibited by commerce and commercial peoples. The fact that these very four nations, which now stand out as the most dependent on foreign com- merce, were the very four nations of which (Mediterranean cities excepted) the same could probably have been said jive hundred years ago, is itself a telling proof of this. And the fact that each of these nations retains now, in the nineteenth century, the distinctive commercial character by which it was marked in the fourteenth, is a further and still more telling proof. Thus, in the four- teenth century, Holland was mainly a commercial as distinguished from a manufacturing country, and it is so now. Belgium was mainly a manu- facturing as distinguished from a commercial coun- try, and it is so now. Switzerland was the same, and it is so now. England was marked by the combination of both commercial and manufacturing enterprize, and it is so now. And again, if we take the case of the great maritime cities of the more self-subsistent coun- c 2 16 On International Reform. tries, barring the exceptional cases alluded to, they certainly have exhibited a striking tenacity of life. The three surviving Hanse towns Hamburg, Lubeck, and Bremen were among the very earliest members of the Hanseatic League. To- gether with Rostock, Wismar, and Danzic, they were the chief commercial ports of North Germany five centuries ago, and they are so still. Marseilles was the chief commercial port of France, and Bar- celona of Spain, in the Middle Ages, and they are so still. Still further, there are districts in self-subsistent countries in which manufactures are now carried on. These are for the most part striking witnesses to that strange tenacity of life which has enabled germs of commerce, planted in unfavourable soil, to retain a struggling vitality through centuries of adverse circumstances. Take, for instance, the manufactures of France. The linen and woollen manufactures of the north, and the silk manu- factures of the south-east, alike date back to the fourteenth century, or an earlier period. And again, those of Spain. Catalonia was the main manufacturing district of Spam in the fourteenth century, and, through all vicissitudes, it is so still. The woollen manufactures of Flanders spread under cover of the Hanseatic League, alono- the banks of the Rhine, and the Rhenish provinces are the great manufacturing district of Germany at the present moment. Interdi pendence of Nations. 17 But will the tenacity of life which has so marked the past history of commercial nations continue? A very brief review of the causes which led most nations to adopt a self-subsistent policy, and the circumstances under which the most dependent nations in spite of these causes maintained their dependence on international commerce, will show clearly that present circumstances are at least far more favourable to its continuance than those of the past. Modern international history may be said to date from the era when the idea of a ' nation 1 became connected with the country inhabited by it. While the great waves of Teutonic emigration were one after another sweeping over Europe, the nation was the tribe or people, irrespective of its local home. The sovereign ruled over the tribe or people and aimed at universal dominion over all lands they might choose to overrun and conquer. Their very laws of tenure were such, it is said, as to compel those of the invading tribe who devoted themselves to agriculture, annually to shift about from one tract of land to another, in order to prevent their becoming rooted to the soil, and thus unfitted for their roaming conquering life. The old international idea of universal sovereignty was essentially a war- like idea. A chieftain's thirst for dominion was like the Indian's thirst for new hunting grounds and endless prey. But the western shores of the known world once reached and conquered, and a limit put 18 On International Reform. to the indefinite extension of dominion, the con- querors themselves were put upon the defensive. If they would not themselves fall a prey to new waves of conquest, they must make a home of their newly conquered hunting ground, and keep it and till it for themselves. And the need of defence against foreign foes, not only ended in rooting the nations to the conquered country; it rooted also the people to the soil on which they individually dwelt. As in an age of perennial war and con- quest the necessities of self-defence drove the nations to adopt a policy of self-subsistence, so in an age of feuds and private war the necessities of self- defence drove every little Feudal knot of society to become self-subsistent and independent of its neighbours. So the Feudal system became neces- sarily identified with the self-subsistent stage of national life. Each manor became a little self-sub- sistent state; organised for self-defence and self- support. And the nation composed of an aggre- gated mass of these self-subsistent atoms, itself became a nation organised for self-defence and self- support. It is obvious then that the Feudal policy of isolation and self-dependence was not adopted because such was the bent of the national mind. It was on the contrary clearly forced upon nations, as it were, against the grain. The national instinct of the nomad tribe for fresh fields of conquest had to give way before the necessities of self-defence. The national hatred of attachment to the soil and Interdependence of Nations. 19 agricultural pursuits had to succumb before the necessities of self-support. And thus the over- ruling cause why most nations entered the self- subsistent stage of national life may be said to have been, the prevalence of international anarchy and Lynch Law which formed so effectual a barrier to international intercourse. The result of this was that the great Feudal nations, thus driven down as it were by anarchy and Lynch Law into a self- subsistent state, left the few cities and districts which devoted them- selves to commerce, to pursue at all risks, a practical monopoly of international trade. A certain amount of trade will be carried on at all hazards, and at all times. There are some things with respect to which even the most self- subsistent nations cannot be self- subsistent. The chief of these were in the Middle Ages : 1st. Fish, an article which the religious creed of the tunes made indispensable, even to the most inland countries. 2nd. Manufactured cloths. 3rd. Foreign luxuries, for which there must always be a greater or less demand. In all these particulars the most self- subsistent nations were, as a matter of fact, not in the main self- subsistent. The fishing trade and maritime enterprise in general of North- Western Europe had, to a great extent, settled itself on the shores of the German 20 On International Reform. Ocean and the Baltic. The manufacture of woollen and other cloths, carried on to some extent in other countries and districts, had mainly fallen into the hands of Flemish weavers. And the trade in Eastern luxuries was very much mono- polised by the cities of the Mediterranean. Thus while neighbouring nations were unnaturally set- tling down under Feudal auspices into the self- subsistent state, these portions of the European community were becoming more and more depen- dent on then: commerce. How did they maintain this dependence ? No doubt the very fact of the monopoly they enjoyed and the large profit they obtained in con- sequence, enabled them to run war risks and bear their losses, just as the prodigious profits of a successful attempt to run a blockade may cover several failures. But the main cause of their great success was their attempt, by no means altogether fruitless, to curb the anarchy which reigned around them, and to establish some sort of law and order in its place. The commercial cities of the Baltic, North Ger- many, and Holland, attained this end by means of the Hanseatic League. Under its shelter, Flemish manufacturing towns attained the highest point of their prosperity. The Swiss preserved their in- dependence and commercial prosperity by means of the Helvetic Confederacy. The commercial cities of the Mediterranean lessened the evils whicli Interdependence of Nations. 21 they could not banish from their seas by adopting as a common code of maritime law the ' Consolato del Mare. 1 But their monopoly, however well maintained, was sure to find itself at last between the horns of a dilemma. For first, the partial failure of these attempts to preserve international peace and order, whether on land or on the seas, left commerce still partially open to the disasters caused by piracy and war history abundantly testifies to this. And secondly, the very success of their attempt the international law and order, more or less main- tained by their united efforts itself broke the bars of their monopoly, removed the barriers to com- merce, and opened the way for other nations to take their natural share of it. The history of the most dependent nations, as will be seen more fully when we come to regard them separately, as a matter of fact, bears ample witness to the check and diminution they received from time to time, mainly from these two causes. Nothing but the tenacity of life to which we have alluded could have dragged them through. Now I suppose it will not be denied that both these causes of harm and danger are, comparing past with present, much diminished. For first, international law and order is respected far more now than in the palmiest days of the Hanseatic league. And secondly, while the gradual removal of the barriers to free trade and intercourse is 22 On International Reform. cutting away the last shreds of the old monopoly, the most dependent nations have no longer to fear but much to gain from its entire surrender. Hence it is concluded as the result of this enquiry upon general grounds, that for the future nations have a better rather than a worse chance of per- manently maintaining a course of dependence on international intercourse than they have had in the past. What then should deprive commerce and commercial peoples of that tenacity of life which has marked their history hitherto ? Cotton famines and the like may cause distress and wounds which it may take years to cure, and therefore it is beyond all doubt our duty to prevent if possible their recur- rence ; but they who chuckle over Lancashire's disaster, and begin to chant the dirge of her pros- perity, know little what they talk about ! If the manufactures of Flanders, Switzerland, France, Spain, and the Rhine have survived five centuries of anarchy, shall British manufactures, under far more advantageous circumstances, now be perma- nently checked by the disasters of half as many years ? III. THE ECONOMIC HISTORY OF ENGLAND. IN turning now to the separate consideration of the economic history and prospects of the ' most depen- Interdependence of Nations. 23 dent ' nations, it may be pardonable to take first the case of our own country. With the establishment of the Feudal system, England, along with other nations, passed, to a great extent, into the self-subsistent state. How did she get out of it ? There are few pages of international history which, if we could get at the facts, would be more instruc- tive, than that which records the partial migration of the fishing trade and woollen manufacture from the Dutch to the British shores of the German ocean, the consequent partial decline of Flemish trade and manufactures, and the planting on English soil five centuries ago of the germ of that mari- time enterprize and manufacturing skill which is the distinctive mark of the English nation at this day. With regard to the fishing trade, something may be attributed to physical causes. The sea gradually encroached on the Dutch shore until at length it converted what was once an inland lake into the Zuyder Zee, and formed what was once part of the main land into the island of Walcheren. It gradually, meanwhile, receded from the English coast forming Yarmouth sands and port, where a bay had once washed inland between the two Roman stations of Burgh and Caister, almost as far as Norwich. And from whatever cause, in 24 On International Reform. course of time, Yarmouth port became a great fishing station, much frequented by Dutch fishing and trading vessels, and ultimately possessing a large and rapidly increasing mercantile marine of its own. It is not perhaps generally known that, under these circumstances, the population of this fishing town had risen by the middle of the four- teenth century to a point which it had not passed four centuries after. With regard to the woollen manufacture, the inundations on the Flemish coast had doubtless something to do with the migration of Flemish worsted weavers to those British ports with which their seamen were most familiar. A more potent cause,- however, was to be found in the internal and international anarchy prevailing around them, notwithstanding the influence of the Hanseatic league. This league did not wholly prevent internal dis- sensions, nor could it prevent nations, who had nothing to do with it, from going to war, or exercising belligerent rights. Flemish manufacturers were greatly dependent on English wool, as Lancashire manufacturers are now dependent upon American cotton. Constant interruption of international intercourse, sometimes for years together, made this dependence of Flemish weavers upon the importation of the raw material from England hazardous in a high degree. When- ever it was the interest of England to do so, Interdependence of Nations. 25 whether as a civil or a military measure, the ex- portation of English wool wa? taxed or prohibited altogether by the English Parliament. Flemish weavers were thus liable to suffer from a wool famine, as our Lancashire weavers are now suffer- ing from a cotton famine. These facts, together with the existence of a strong and tolerably settled government in England, were sufficient to induce large numbers of Flemings to migrate with their looms across the German Ocean to the land from whence much of their supply of wool had hitherto been drawn. The consequence to England was that the towns of the Eastern Counties began to swarm with worsted weavers, and the manufacture of cloth, by degrees spreading into other districts, took permanent root on British soil, and became a recognised source of employment and wealth to the English town population. It is not perhaps generally known that the result of this Flemish immigration and the internal mi- gration from rural to manufacturing districts which followed as its natural consequence, was so marked that the population of the counties in which the woollen manufacture rooted itself increased with almost incredible rapidity. I believe it may be stated with safety that the counties of Suffolk, Norfolk, and Lincoln, and the East Riding of York- shire, contained as large or a larger population in 1347 than, after a lapse of five centuries, they did in 1847. 26 On International Reform. . And this important and almost forgotten fact bore other fruits. The stream of emigration from the rural to the manufacturing districts naturally bore with it bond as well as free men. It presented a kind of * under- ground railroad,' somewhat analogous to that be- tween slave and free states in America, for the fugitive serf who could prove residence in a free town for a year and a day was legally enfranchised, and beyond the reach of any fugitive slave law. The weeding out by the dread pestilence of 1348-9 of perhaps two or three millions (out of five or six millions) of the English people struck another blow at the already undermined institution. Leaving the number of British acres unreduced, but reducing the number of tillers of them perhaps by one-half, this deadly plague caused great scarcity of labour. The value of the serf, in other words, rose in the market, and, luckily for him, his pluck rose with his sense of power. The towns had suffered as much or even more than the country. There was great scarcity of labour in the towns, and consequently the wages of labour rose to double or treble their former amounts. What a premium this on the further immigration of fugitive serfs ! Landowners invoked the aid of Parliament. Statutes were passed reciting that 1 a great part of the people had died of the pesti- lence,' and enacting that serfs and labourers should work for the same services and wages as if nothing Interdependence of Nations. 27 had occurred. But what were Acts of Parliament in such a case ? In their own recitals we read the history of half a century of constant strikes and risings of the serfs, maintained as strikes are now by systematic contributions, of wholesale immigra- tion of fugitive serfs into the towns by connivance of the townsmen, and finally of the general rising in various parts of England, known as Wat Tyler's rebellion. The result of all this was that serfdom was once for all turned up by the roots and the vegetable phase of the serf's history ended for ever. That portion of the British population which hitherto had been rooted to the soil now became, like the free town population, by its own act, to a great extent detached from the soil, and dependent upon wages in return for free work done. Nor was the freedom of the peasantry a one- sided bargain. Serfs having claimed the right to do as they liked with their labour, landlords soon learned to do what they liked with their land. The depopulation of the pestilence had permanently reduced its market value for ordinary agricultural purposes. There were no longer hands enough, bond or free, to till the cultivated land of England as it had been tilled before. And therefore, be- cause it required fewer hands and paid them better, landowners began very naturally to turn arable land by wholesale into sheep walks, and grow wool instead of corn. Because feeding sheep paid them 28 On International Reform. better than feeding what villein-tenants still re- mained rooted to the soil, multitudes of these latter were from time to time uprooted, and, in modern phrase, ' ejected ' by the landlords to make room for sheep. Thus was the emancipation of the serfs, as it were, completed and sealed by the landlords. The result of these and other causes was the most important fact in English economic history, that the freedom of British serfs did not end in peasant proprietorship, as in most other Feudal countries. They carried no part of the land with them, as the Russian serfs are doing, but became a free, detached, and, so to speak, loose population, de- pendent upon whatsoever they could turn their hands to ; and mainly upon wages for free work done* The social condition of Britain at the com- mencement of the Tudor period may be thus described : 1st. The population was not nearly so large as it had been 300 years before. 2nd. The number of labourers employed in agriculture had certainly been greatly reduced; because a much larger propor- tion of the land than formerly was in pasture instead of under the plough. 3rd. Although the towns were themselves but the shadows of what they had been before * I have, since the above was written, entered much more fully into the history of the causes which produced this effect, in articles contributed to the Fortnightly Review, on ' The Black Death ' and ' The Land Question.' Interdependence of Nations. 29 the plague, the proportion of the town or trading population as compared with the agricultural population was probably very much greater than in most countries. 4th. The masses of the population, both in town and country, were becoming detached from the soil, hiring out their own labour in the open market, and dependent upon wages for free work done. 5th. At the same time there existed in England the germs of maritime enterprise and manu- facturing skill. In these few facts we have the key to the after history of the British nation. Had the masses of the British peasantry emerged out of Feudal serfdom into a condition of peasant proprietorship, as, through gradual stages of tenancy-at-will, copyhold tenure, and so forth, some of them undoubtedly did, had peasant pro- prietorship become the rule instead of the exception, the history of the British nation would have been turned into another groove. A gradually increasing population, gradually bringing new land under cultivation, and increasing only as fast as im- proving agriculture would permit the powerful check afforded by a system of peasant proprietor- ship keeping the population within limits propor- tioned to the limits of the land the land itself, cut up into narrow patches like the land of France, producing, under garden cultivation, food enough D 30 On International Reform. to feed about as many millions as dwell upon it now ; but those millions, instead of being pretty equally divided between town and country, scat- tered more evenly and densely over the whole land, no Manchesters, and Birmingham^, and Glas- gows, with their tall chimneys and crowded nests of population to break the general monotony such might have been the present condition of England had her early history been other than what it was. But the facts being as they were, the masses of the people being at the Tudor period, owing to facts in their past history, detached from the land and dependent upon daily wages, the proportion of town to country population being great and in- creasing, the germ of maritime and commercial en- terprise being already implanted, the British nation was doomed as it were, by its social and economic condition, under the laws of political economy, to take the course which it did take to increase rapidly in population, until at length it burst the narrow limits of its island home. We see clear symptoms of the commencement of this rapid increase throughout the Tudor period symptoms exactly the reverse of those which fol- lowed the depopulations of the pestilence of 1348-9 a steady fall in wages, and rise in the value of land. A race now fairly set in between the increase of population and the improvement and extension of agriculture. So long as more and more land could Interdependence of Nations. 31 be brought under cultivation, the race might go on. But while it might last for centuries, it is clear that it could not last for ever. Population in the end must outrun agricultural extension, be- cause the one was necessarily limited while the other was not. This point in the nation's history was reached during the closing decades of the eighteenth cen- tury. The fact that the importation of corn then commenced on a large scale afforded an unmistak- able waymark. The population had trebled since the Tudor period, and it became evident, that unless fresh means of subsistence could be found for the rapidly increasing population, or some great and effectual check put upon its increase, the evils and miseries of over-population must be en- countered in all their force. That indeed would be an ill day for England when, like an overstocked rabbit-warren, the only escape from misery and want, to the remainder, would be the periodic thinning out of surplus population, by famine, pestilence, or war! But happily England was saved from so hard a fate by the ingenuity of a few of her sons. It is not too much to say that the discovery of the mode of smelting iron with coal instead of wood, of the cotton jenny, and of the steam engine, doubled the resources of the British nation, and allowed another ten millions to be added to the population without lessening the prosperity of the rest. 2 32 On International Reform. The great revolution brought about by these discoveries was not accomplished without the throes and struggles which accompany all great social revolutions. Transition periods are usually dark ones. The evil becomes deeper, and is more keenly felt on the eve of deliverance. The cure often aggravates the disease for awhile. The pres- sure of over-population was increased for the moment by the introduction of steam power and machinery. Hand-loom weavers waging a hard warfare against the competition not only of their fellows, but also of these new agents which were found to do their work cheaper than poor toiling hands could, did not witness very clearly to the nation's coming prosperity ! Population, as it always does, had taken a fresh spring from the development of new resources. An increasing demand for labour had increased both the supply of labourers and the ratio of their increase : and the result was that the adoption of that free trade policy which it is the economical interest of all nations to adopt, had become an absolute necessity to England. The old medieval policy, which would have cooped up a crowded popu- lation within this little sea-girt empire without giving free scope to its resources, could no longer stand against the wild and dangerous discontent its evils stirred up in the hearts of the caged millions. Chartism with its ' monster meetings,' incendiaiy fires, incessant strikes and riots, proved too clearly Interdependence of Nations. 33 that the great pulse of the nation was beating in feverish excitement against the bars of its prison- house. The British nation was forced, willingly or unwillingly, to stretch out as it were its arms to other nations, and freely to draw from them in one way or another the needful means wherewith to maintain the prosperity of a people, whose numbers had far outgrown the limits of their little island home and were still rapidly increasing. Thus from the fourteenth century downwards, the economic history of England has pursued its course to a very great extent not only without regard to the intentions or policy of successive governments, but directly in their teeth. It was in the teeth of acts of Plantagenet par- liaments that the English peasantry became free workers for wages instead of peasant proprietors. It was in the teeth of Tudor legislation that the still further detachment of the people from the soil was accomplished by the rage for sheep farming. It was in the teeth of modern corn laws that the population of England became dependent on foreign supplies of food. The freedom of the pea- santry and the freedom of international commerce, were alike wrung out of reluctant governments. They bowed to necessity no doubt, but in neither case did they do so until they saw it was hopeless to resist. And what is the result? Why surely this, 34 On International Reform. that having been thus far carried along by a cur- rent which is bearing us still further in a course of dependence on international intercourse a current, the force of which we cannot withstand, and the course of which it is impossible greatly to control we must still further bend our policy whenever necessary to altered circumstances, instead of expecting unalterable laws to bend to our traditional policy. And what are our altered circumstances ? Plainly these, we have, under the operation of the laws of political economy, passed, during the past half-century, fairly out of the self-subsistent stage of national life, and irrevocably entered upon a course of great and increasing dependence on international trade. It is not only that a million or two of men, women, and children have become dependent on the cotton trade, and that this fact has placed us in the awkward predicament, that, although we annually spend upon our army and navy 25,000,000 sterling, the blockade of a few ports 3,000 miles away, which we have no right to break, inflicts almost as great an injury on us as the blockaded states. If this were the only instance of our dependence on international trade, it might be treated as an exceptional case, and it might be said with some truth that it would be an unsound policy to legislate for exceptional cases. But it is Interdependence of Nations. 35 not so. The silk, on the wages earned in the manufacture of which some 250,000 of men, women, and children are directly dependent, is all imported, like cotton, from abroad. The same may be said of the hemp, upon which about 80,000 are alike dependent. No inconsiderable portion of the flax manufactured in Britain is imported from abroad, and upon this importation somewhere near 80,000 persons may be said to be dependent. The stoppage, by blockades or anything else, of the supply of these articles would be tantamount to stopping the wages the bread fund of these hundreds of thousands of honest workmen, just as the stoppage of the supply of cotton stops the wages of the cotton weavers. More than this, the wages of the British manu- facturing classes are dependent not only upon the regular importation of the raw material by the manufacture of which they earn their bread. They run a double risk. They are also liable to be stopped or abridged by the stoppage wholly or in part of our export trade to those countries which consume the manufactured article. Thus inasmuch as three-fourths if not four-fifths of the cotton goods we manufacture are exported to other coun- tries; therefore, in addition to the whole bread fund of the million or two dependent upon the cotton trade being liable to be cut short by inter- ruption of our trade with cotton -growing countries, three -fourths at least of that bread fund is also 36 On International Reform. liable to be cut short by interruption of our trade with those foreign countries which consume our cotton goods. The interruption of our export trade means, in plain English, mills working half- time or standing altogether. And so in the w6ollen trade, if half our woollen manufactured goods are exported, then half the bread fund of the half million dependent on the manufacture runs the risk of stoppage or abridgment from the stoppage or abridgment of our export trade. If a million are dependent on the iron trade, half their bread-fund runs the same risk. So of the 100,000 dependent on the earthenware trade; and the 100,000 dependent on the tin trade. And so we might go on. With so many millions of citizens (for these figures add up to millions) whose wages are more or less dependent upon the maintenance of peace- ful international intercourse, we can hardly con- ceive of any war of long duration in any quarter of the globe which would not by throwing them out of employment rob thousands of their bread. Xor is it the occupation and wages alcne of so many millions of the British people that have be- come thus dependent upon foreign trade and liable to be cut off by the quarrels of other nations or our own. During the seven years ending 1858 something like four millions, on the average, of the British nation were annually fed on foreign corn. The Interdependence of Nations. 37 fact is clear enough a considerable proportion every year, and after a bad harvest a very large proportion of our food, is imported from other countries, and without that foreign supply millions of our people must inevitably starve. Imagine for a moment then what the effect must have been upon England if the war had been be- tween America and some other nation who had blockaded both Northern and Southern ports. Undoubtedly, in addition to the present cotton famine we should have had corn at a famine price too ; and, with corn at a famine price, how would the rest of England have been able to keep alive the half million cotton weavers in addition to their own poor? And if we have of late imported more and more of corn from abroad, it seems generally admitted that we are likely to want still larger supplies in future. ' The nations of the West ' (observes a writer in the Quarterly Review} ' have gradually become less capable of supplying themselves with food. While thousands of mouths are added daily to the number to be fed, agriculture, with all its marvellous im- provements and scientific appliances, is unable to keep pace with the progress of population. A few years ago England was able to feed her own people from the produce of her own fields ; she now buys grain to the annual value of more than 12,000,000, and it is probable that before many years have 3 8 On International Reform. passed England and France together may be under the necessity of importing corn to the annual value of 40,000,000.' Again, the same writer speaks of 4 the very probable diminution of cereal cultivation in England, in consequence of the preference now given by many farmers to the rearing of stock.' Owing to the character of her climate he argues that 4 England is placed relatively under very dis- advantageous conditions for the production of corn, while she need fear no rival in the raising of stock ; ' and concludes that 4 a change in the present cha- racter of our husbandry, by laying down a larger proportion of land in artificial grasses, pasture, and green crops seems, therefore, highly probable.' (Quarterly Review, July 1863.) There is yet another direction in which the dependence of England on free international inter- course has, during the past half-century, evinced itself. The tendency of the free trade policy adopted by England has undoubtedly been to remove those harsh checks upon the increase of population which must otherwise have probably periodically thinned the too crowded ranks of a miserable and ill-condi- tioned people. The increase of employment result- ing from a great export trade, and the abundance of food occasioned by the free importation of corn, have no doubt acted as a direct stimulus to the increase of population. Nor has it been an un- Interdependence of Nations. 39 healthy stimulus by any means ; for there is no virtue in a restraint for which there is no necessity, nor can we well find fault Avith an increase for which there is both demand and a fair provision. Look at the facts. The rate of increase during the last decennial period of the population of the United Kingdom was only *6 per annum, owing to the actual dimi- nution of the population of Ireland after the Irish famine. This may fairly be looked upon as an exceptional case. The rates of increase in the home population of England and Wales were : 1831-41 . . 1'4 per cent, per annum. 1841-51 . . 1-3 1851-61 . . 1-2 During the same periods the emigration from the United Kingdom was as follows : 1831-41 . . 703,000 1841-51 . . 1,684,000 1851-61 . . 2,287,000 Thus during these thirty years the rate of in- crease has steadily diminished, while emigration has as steadily increased. During these thirty years 4,674,000 emigrants had left our shores. Between 1815 arid 1860 the number of emigrants was more than 5,000,000. We can hardly say that the state of society re- vealed by these figures is other than it ought to be. Whatever the peculiar advantages of a sta- tionary state would be under other circumstances, it would surely be anything but the index of 40 .On International Reform. prosperity as things are. A condition of society in which, owing to its prosperity and the elasticity of its resources, the population is rapidly increasing, and in which the new generations, instead of hang- ing heavily on the resources of their parents, rapidly move off to other lands and rely upon their own, is surely under existing moral and economical circumstances a far more healthy one. Yet these facts, though illustrating as they do the increased prosperity of our country, illustrate also very strongly the state of dependence upon international intercourse into which we have steadily drifted. What would have happened to England, we may well ask, had her five million emigrants and their descendants remained at home ? Who can tell what a debt of gratitude we owe to America for affording the outlet she has done during the past half-century to at least three-fifths of our surplus population? What should we do for the future, if anything were to occur which should close the channels through which during the past ten years we have been pouring out emi- grants at the rate of 228,000 per annum? The importance of this source of relief to the population of the British Empire will at once be seen if we compare the annual number of emigrants with the annual increase in the home population between 1851 and 1861. Average number of emigrants per annum from the United Kingdom . . . 228,000 Interdependence of Nations. 41 Average annual increase in the home population of the United Kingdom . . 152,000 From this comparison it appears that the rate of annual increase of the population of the United Kingdom would have been much more than doubled had these emigrants remained at home. So dependent has England become upon an outlet to other nations for her surplus population ! Now had all this been foreseen and proposed before it came to pass, as a result to be obtained by a certain policy 011 the part of the government, would it not have been firmly opposed? Would it not have been urgently objected that to allow the people of these realms to increase so rapidly, relying upon foreign raw material for their employ- ment, foreign markets for the disposal of their manufactures, foreign corn for their food, and an outlet to foreign lands for one or two hundred thousand per annum of surplus population, was to make the prosperity of the British nation dependent upon the maintenance of everlasting peace with all the world? Would not cautious statesmen have foretold that the first war would bring a nation pursuing such a policy to rack and ruin? Would not they have denounced it as a ' policy of political suicide ' ? Yet in fact we have embarked upon a policy which, to be successful, does require the maintenance of strict justice, peace, and order between nations. Under the irresistible guidance 42 On International Jieform. of economic laws, and in spite of some counter legislation, we have pursued this policy with marked success during half a century of all but unbroken peace ; and now at length when its results have attained a magnitude which we never dreamed of, and which bear us on without the least chance of our being able to reverse our policy now we find that we have yet to solve the further problem, how that justice, peace, and order are to be maintained without resort to those commercial block' ades and other usages of war which injlict such grievous injury upon even neutral nations. IV. THE ECONOMIC HISTORY OF HOLLAND. It will not be needful to dwell long upon the economic history and condition of Holland. The facts are too clear to admit of dispute. The population of Holland is denser than the British population. Her imports and exports bear a larger proportion to the population than British imports and exports do. Her commerce is of far longer standing than British commerce; and it may be said with truth to be almost the only string to her bow. Her agriculture is not capable of indefinite extension, and she does not possess that mineral wealth which has fallen to the lot of other countries ; consequently, Holland more than any other country is dependent upon foreign commerce for the prosperity, and even for the very Interdependence of Nations. 43 subsistence, of her people. Her history presents the most remarkable instance upon record of national vitality under great natural reverses, and is a signal example of that tenacity of life to which we have alluded as an attribute of com- mercial peoples. The Dutch, as a nation, never sank as did most European nations through Feudal auspices into the self-subsistent state. In the first ages of modern history we find them engrossing nearly the whole sea-fishery of Europe, and largely engaged in general international trade. Dutch trading cities were among the first to join the Hanseatic League, and also among the first to secede from it when they had grown strong enough to do without its protection. In later times, the internal and international anarchy which ruled everywhere threw the chief part of the carrying trade of the civilised world into the hands of Dutch shipowners. During the 17th century it is estimated that the international trade of Holland was nearly as great as that of all the rest of Europe put together. She is said to have owned nearly half the whole shipping of Europe. Then came her reverses : 1st. As other nations diverted their energies from military to commercial enterprise, her monopoly gave way. She lost the un- natural advantage which she had hitherto enjoyed through their neglect. 2nd. Though her enormous commerce enabled 44 On International Reform. her to push to a successful issue her long struggle with Spain, yet the heavy taxation entailed thereby, and by her wars with England and France, proved more than her already declining commerce could easily support. Holland, in consequence, lost that commercial ascendancy which she formerly enjoyed. Neither the French occupation nor the union with Belgium was conducive to her prosperity, and although a brighter day appears to have dawned with her separation from the latter, yet she probably never will regain the relative international position she has lost. Notwithstanding, however, that her past com- mercial history may have exceeded in brightness her commercial prospects for the future, the fact remains that her foreign trade is greater in pro- portion to her population than the foreign trade of any other country. To protect this commerce she expends more upon her army and navy, in proportion to her population, than any other countries, except Eng- land and France, in addition to bearing the burden of a debt larger in proportion than that of any other country except England. It is obvious also that any further decline in her trade, or decrease in her population, from emigration or otherwise, would greatly increase the burden of these annual charges. Interdependence of Nations. 45 In a word, it is clear that the future welfare of Holland, to a still greater extent even than that of England, is dependent on the general main- tenance for the future of peaceful commercial intercourse between nations, and the avoidance on her own part of the expense which any future wars in her own defence must entail upon her. V. THE ECONOMIC HISTORY OF BELGIUM. BELGIUM has been noted for her manufactures since the age of Charlemagne. If Holland affords the most remarkable instance upon record of tenacity of life in a commercial people, Belgium affords at least as remarkable an instance of tenacity of life in a manufacturing people. For eleven centuries at least Flemish manufacturing industry has held its course through all vicissitudes. This in itself is a remarkable fact. But what makes it doubly remarkable is the further fact that throughout these eleven hundred years from the age of Charlemagne to the present moment the main branch of the manufacture of Belgium has been dependent upon the importation of the raw material from abroad. Flemish weavers imported English and Spanish wool long before the Normans con- quered England. At the present moment nearly all the wool manufactured in Belgium is imported from other countries. 46 On International Reform. But although the manufactures of Belgium have survived for so long a period, like the commerce of Holland they have suffered loss and diminution over and over again from inter- national causes. That portion of Flemish trade which was con- nected with the Mediterranean, and the overland route to India, of course declined with the decline of Venice and Genoa. This could not be helped. But, from first to last, the chief enemy of Flemish prosperity has been the constant unsettlement of international affairs. We have seen how much Flemish prosperity owed to the protection of the Hanseatic League. But we have also seen how England gained a share of the Flemish woollen manufacture, chiefly in consequence of those inter- ruptions of international trade which the Hanseatic League was powerless to prevent. Her own in- ternal condition moreover the want of unity between her independent towns left her an easy prey to foreign invasion. The death knell of Bel- gium was all but tolled when she passed under Spanish rule. Civil misrule and religious perse- cutions, together with the arbitrary stoppage of the Scheldt for a century, were causes adequate to produce the ruinous results which marked the period of Spanish dominion. If to these causes we add the fact that, during the century succeeding her release from the Spanish yoke, Belgium was to a great extent the battle-field of Europe, we shall Interdependence of Nations. 47 have mentioned causes sufficient to account for the decline of her manufacturing industry. In the meantime the decline of her manufac- turing industry seems to have thrown her people upon their agricultural resources. And as, like their French neighbours, and from somewhat similar causes, Belgian peasants to a very large extent became proprietors of the soil, it was a natural consequence that the population of Belgium should not increase at a very rapid ratio. The agricultural population between 1836 and 1855 had hardly increased at all. The figures were : 1836 . . 3,261,456 1856 . . 3,348,189 The increase in twenty years was 86,733, or *14 per cent, per annum. But the town population had increased much more rapidly. Under the influence of internal and international peace, the old manufacturing spirit has risen again into great and increasing activity. The develop- ment of the great mineral wealth of Belgium has also added largely to her industrial resources. Consequently during the period within which the agricultural population has very much remained stationary, the town population has steadily in- creased. The figures were : 1836 1856 2 48 On International Reform. Shewing an increase of 200,230, or 1 per cent, per annum. Thus the proportion of town and country popu- lation has been of late gradually changing, and as the town, or rapidly increasing element, has . in- creased in relative importance, and the rural or stationary element relatively decreased, as a natural consequence the rate of increase of the whole popu- lation has steadily increased also. The ratio of town to rural population was as under : 1836 as 31 to 100 1846 as 34 to 100 1856 as 35 to 100 The rate of increase in the total population was as under : 1836-46 . . '22 per cent, per annum. 1846-56 . . -63 1856-60 (about) -70 The fact would seem to be, therefore, that the extension of Belgian industrial enterprise, and the consequent growth of her town population, are very rapidly removing that check which for a long period the system of peasant proprietorship im- posed upon a population already more densely crowded within their narrow territory than that of any other European State. And what is to stop this rapidly increasing in- crease ? So long as in her mining and manufac- turing enterprise there is a demand for labour and Interdependence of Nations. 49 a provision for an increasing population, what can stop it ? As we have stated, Belgium was rather a manu- facturing than a commercial or maritime nation ten centuries ago, and she is so still. As the King of the Belgians has himself declared, ' the genius of his people is for industrial pursuits at home rather than for a maritime enterprise.' A nation without either a merchant or military marine must be peculiarly susceptible of injury from the quarrels of her neighbours ; and Belgium is nearly in this position. She possesses no navy ; and so insignificant is even her merchant marine that its tonnage, if multiplied tenfold, would not bear the same proportion to the value of her im- ports and exports that the tonnage of the British merchant marine bears to the value of British imports and exports. To set against this, it may be said that she has the advantage of her perpetual neutrality being guaranteed by the great powers. Undoubtedly she has ; but her peculiar political position, while sparing her the large military expenditure of nations who rely solely on their own power for their own defence, does not do anything to screen her from injuries inflicted by the quarrels of other nations upon neutral commerce. She has, like England, to complain of 'great distress in some branches of industry ' which the 50 On International Reform. American war and tariff ' have destroyed ' (Mr. Sand- ford to Mr. Seward, May 10th, 1861); and there can be little doubt that her future welfare is as much bound up as that of other nations in the solution of those international problems to which attention is called in these pages. VI. THE ECONOMIC HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. The economic history of Switzerland presents considerable analogy to that of Belgium. From the fourteenth century she has been dis- tinguished, like Belgium, as a manufacturing rather than as a commercial nation. In Switzerland, as in Belgium, agriculture has been carried on side by side with manufactures, by a hardy and thrifty race of peasant proprietors. Consequently two forces, so to speak, have been at work the one tending to check the increase of population, the other tending to produce it. There is in fact in Switzerland, as in Belgium, an almost stationary agricultural population side by side with a rapidly increasing manufacturing population. Thus the rate of annual increase in the manufac- turing Canton of Neufchatel, between 1850 and 1860, was 2 '3, and in that of Geneva 2*9, while the rate of annual increase in the wholly agricul- tural Canton of the Orisons was only '09, and in the Canton of Tessin, where there are special laws Interdependence of Nations. 51 preventing the sub-division of estates, there was an actual decrease. If we divide the cantons roughly into two divisions, classing Appenzell (ex.), St. Gall, Thurgau, Zurich, Aargau, Basle, Geneva, and Neufchatel, as manufacturing cantons, and the remaining cantons as agricultural, the population and annual increase were as follows : Manufacturing Cantons. Population in 1850 964,186 do. 1860 1,041,905 Increase 76,719 or -8 per cent. Agricultural Cantons. Population in 1850 1,427,554 1860 1,468,589 Increase 41,035 or '3 per cent. These figures are sufficient to show how steadily, as in Belgium, the manufacturing, or increasing element is gaining ascendancy over the agricultural or stationary element of Swiss population. Still further: Switzerland like Belgium pos- sesses no merchant marine of her own. She is dependent altogether upon neighbouring nations for the prosecution of her commerce, and inasmuch as owing to the peculiar character of her territory, she possesses very little corn-growing land, and has consequently to import nearly all the corn consumed by her people, it is evident to how great extent her prosperity is bound up with the peaceful maintenance of international intercourse,, without needless interruption or risk of. disturbance. 52 On International Reform. VII. GENERAL RESULT AS TO THE ' MOST DEPENDENT' NATIONS. To SUM up the main results of this enquiry into the economic history and tendency of the most dependent class of nations : 1st. Their past history exhibits strikingly the tenacity of life which has characterised their commerce and manufactures. 2nd. They have had to suffer greatly, owing to their dependence upon international inter- course, from its interruption at various times, although they have outlived these international storms. 3rd. They are clearly becoming more and more dependent upon international intercourse, and consequently liable to suffer more and more from its interruption in the future. And, finally, these results appear to be the inevitable consequence, under the laws of nature, of facts in the past history of these nations, and therefore to be beyond their present control. The Governments of these nations cannot prevent this growing dependence of their people upon inter- national intercourse any more than they can stop the rising tide. The current of international history will pursue its course in spite of any legislation of theirs. The web of international inter-dependence will become more and more Interdependence of Nations. 53 delicate and intricate. Its separate threads will become more and more entangled together. The clumsy machinery of the present international system will become less and less adequate to meet the needs arising from these altered circum- stances. With whatever tenacity, therefore, our states- men may cling to the traditions of the Foreign Office, and seek to maintain the international system as it is, it does not seem likely that circum- stances and the Laws of Nature will be made to bend so as to comport themselves with its harsh methods and antiquated forms. And if circum- stances and laws of nature cannot be made to bend to the international svstem, it is certain that the tt International system will have to bend to them. VIII. THE ' SELF SUBSISTENT ' NATIONS. FRANCE. IN turning from the ' most dependent ' nations to consider the economic history and tendency of those which as yet have not fully emerged out of the * self-subsistent ' state, it will not be needful for our purpose that we should enter into a detailed examination of the case of each nation separatel} T . But the case of France is so singular and at the c same time so important, that it may be well to devote a separate section to its consideration. 54 On International Reform. France entered with England into the feudal and self-subsistent stage of national life. She also possessed linen, woollen, and silk manufactures of her own as early as the fourteenth century. The great plague of 1348 is stated, moreover, to have reduced by its terrible ravages the larger popula- tion of France in about the same proportion as it did the English population a statement which, having evidence for the fact of the great depo- pulation in England, we cannot doubt was at least founded on fact. But the economic results of the plague do not appear to have been the same in France as in England. It does not appear to have had the intimate connexion with the emancipation of the serfs in France that it had in England. We read indeed of many charters of enfranchisement both before and after the plague ; but nothing of any great emigration of freed or fugitive serfs from the country into the towns. Probably neither the prosperity of the towns, nor the extent of the manufactures, was sufficient to produce such a result. Those feudal serfs who were enfranchised by charter generally carried the ownership of the land with them, as the Russian serfs are now doing, instead of being detached from the land, as in the case of the English serfs. The French peasantry emerged, in fact, out of serfdom into a condition of peasant proprietorship. And further, instead of the number of peasant proprietors lessening century after century as in Interdependence of Nations. 55 England, successive events have, in the course of French history, from time to time tended to increase the number. Thus, while in Tudor England landlords were ejecting peasants and yeomen and forming large grazing farms, in France the lands of the impoverished noblesse were passing into other hands and undergoing constant subdivi- sion. And again, the religious persecutions, which drove the Huguenot silk-weavers out of France to swell the manufacturing population of England, not only lessened the proportion of the manu- facturing population of France, but rooted still further her rural peasantry to the soil. For it is well known that they caused a still further sub- division of the landed estates. And lastly, the great French Revolution marked another era when the feudal peasantry of France became possessors of land. The result has been that in France there are five or six millions of landed proprietors. Of these about four millions may be fairly classed as peasant proprietors, and they are said to own about one-third of the whole soil of France. At the same time, the long periods of civil and foreign war, the religious persecutions and political revolutions, which have marked her history, together with the absence of great mineral wealth, have kept back the town population of France to such an extent, that while in England the population is about equally divided between town and country, in France only one-fifth of the population appear 56 On International Reform. to reside in towns of more than fifteen hundred inhabitants. With four-fifths of the whole population rural, and the large majority of the rural families living on their own land in a condition of peasant pro- prietorship (that condition which of all others im- poses the most effectual check upon population) France would appear to have inherited from her past history precisely that economic condition which would naturally tend to keep her population within limits proportioned to the limits of her land, and to keep the nation itself for a lengthened period in the self-subsistent stage of national life. And what is the fact? France has accordingly until very recently had perhaps the most stationary population of any civilised nation except Austria and Portugal. The census of 1856 revealed the striking fact that during the previous five years the population had hardly increased at all. But can even France, with all these economic causes in her favour, continue permanently in the self-subsistent stage of national life? It would appear that she cannot. The census of 1856, while it revealed that her total population had hardly increased at all, re- vealed also that France presented no exception to the all but universal tendency of modern nations towards the preponderance of the town or increas- ing element as compared with the rural or sta- tionary element in the population. It revealed the Interdependence of Nations. 57 fact that while the rural population had been steadily decreasing the town population had been steadily increasing, chiefly owing to the emigration from the rural districts to the towns. If this state of things were to continue a point must be reached at length where the increasing element must gain a preponderance over the decreasing element, and the ratio of increase in the whole population in- crease with it. The census of 1861 has indicated pretty clearly that this point has already been passed. During the five years succeeding the census of 1851 the total population was shown to have increased more than twice and nearly three times as rapidly as it did during the five years which preceded it. Should economic laws continue to work unmo- lested by those frequent political vicissitudes which give so uncertain an element to French statistics, there can be little doubt therefore but that the population of France will increase in the future at an increasing ratio. Already the value of her imports and exports bears a larger proportion to her population than is the case with the other self-subsistent nations, and with the exception of Italy her population is more dense probably than any of theirs. Already about every other year France does not yield enough corn to feed her people, and she is dependent on foreign importations to supply the deficiency. 58 On International Reform. Already the wages of some half million of the French working-classes are said to be dependent upon the supply of American cotton, and at this moment they are sharing with us the miseries en- tailed by the American War. Already Free trade doctrines are creeping into France, and commercial treaties are entered into with other countries, with the express object of breaking down the barriers which have hitherto unduly checked her international trade. Already, in fact, France is embarking, to say the least of it, on a policy which must end in increased international dependence, and when once she has fairly weighed anchor and committed herself to the current, it is hard to see how she can ever return to the old feudal self-subsistent policy, which she has, until recently, so long endeavoured to pursue. IX. OTHER SELF-SUBSISTENT NATIONS. WITH regard to other nations belonging to the self- subsistent class, it will be sufficient for our present purpose to make one or two general remarks. 1st. For the most part their experience proves no exception to the general rule that the town or commercial class in a country is the increasing one, the agricultural, the stationary one. And consequently the tendency, so far as it goes, is towards the Interdependence of Nations. 59 ascendancy of the commercial element, even in the case of these nations. 2nd. However long they may continue in the self-subsistent state, and however far they may lag behind in the race towards a greater and greater dependence on inter- national trade, their condition and interests in these respects differ not in kind but only in degree, from those of the ' most dependent' nations. The peaceful pro- secution of international trade is of great and increasing importance even to them, though it may not be the life and death question to them which it is to the 'most dependent' nations: even its temporary stoppage must injure them, though it may not inflict so dangerous a wound. And nations, like men, are in the habit of pro- viding against less evils as well as against greater ones. They are careful to pre- serve and even increase their prosperity as well as to guard against ruin. 3rd. It may be remarked further, that although the same international causes may affect these nations as nations less severely than the ' more dependent ' nations, yet from their peculiar geographical and political position, those of their people who do devote themselves to commercial pursuits run a far greater risk of injury and even ruin than 60 On International Reform. the commercial classes of the most dependent countries. Wars and even the distant rumours of wars are often found to para- lyse their trade ; and this is in many cases the main reason why these nations are un- naturally kept still in the self-subsistent state, when, had they simply been left to follow their true interests, unchecked by political and international causes, they would ere this have passed into the more dependent stage of national life. It does not therefore need further arguments to prove that the future prosperity even of the most self-subsistent nations is already, to some extent, and is becoming more and more, bound up with that of other nations, in the solution of those inter- national problems to which attention is called in the following pages. X. NATIONS IN THE YOUTHFUL STAGE. NATIONS passing through the * youthful ' stage are not, as a rule, dependent on international trade for the necessaries of life. But they are in a great degree dependent upon peaceful intercourse with other countries for their supply of luxuries and emigrants, as well as for the means of realising the value of that surplus of natural products in which consists their peculiar wealth. PAKT II. ON THE INADEQUACY OF THE PRESENT INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM AND IN WHAT IT CONSISTS. CHAPTER i. I. RESULTS OF THE PRECEDING ENQUIRY. THE results of the foregoing enquiry may be stated thus : 1st. Two nations, Holland and England, fairly are launched as it were upon a course of dependence upon other nations, not only for luxuries, but even for the means of employment and the supply of food for their people. 2nd. Other European nations, by reason of the universally more rapid growth of their town as compared with their rural popu- lation, are more or less steadily tending towards the same goal. Some of them, especially France and Belgium, are already approaching the verge of the self-subsistent state, and are fast preparing to follow Holland and England into the dependent stage of national life. 3rd. Young countries, in all quarters of the globe, are rapidly rising by means of international intercourse in the scale of nations, and are dependent, as nations in this stage always are, upon the .older * 2 64 On International Reform. nations rather for luxuries and emigrants the means of enjoying and increasing their surplus wealth than for the actual necessaries of life. Combining these results into one wide view of the whole, we find the population of civilised Christendom rapidly increasing ; we find it spread- ing over new lands where the raw products of the earth are more abundant. We find, in con- sequence, the necessaries of human life tending to become more abundant and cheaper, and a larger and larger proportion of the human race set at liberty, in consequence, for the contri- vance and manufacture of the luxuries of life. We find these latter becoming more and more diffused amongst the masses of the people, and even wheedling their way into barbarous and half- civilised countries; and the consequence of this again is a growing mutual dependence springing up even between civilised and uncivilised nations. In a word, we find the system of division and co- operation of labour forcing its way into inter- national as well as social society, economising for the benefit of all nations the labour and wealth of each the several countries and peoples pro- ducing what the commonweal of nations most requires, and what they are best fitted and able to supply. Inadequacy of War. 65 II. MODERN MODES OF WARFARE ARE BECOMING INCREASINGLY INJURIOUS TO NEUTRALS, AND INCREASINGLY INEFFICIENT IN THE HANDS OF BELLIGERENTS. SUCH being the economic history, condition, and tendencies of international society, it remains very briefly to point out the chief practical results which have followed, affecting the ques- tion immediately under discussion in this Essay. They are two : 1st. The practice of Modern Warfare is be- coming more and more injurious to the interests of nations, and especially of neutrals. 2nd. It is at the same time becoming less arid less efficient, as a means of attaining the ends of international justice, in the hands of belligerents. Especially clear are these two facts, if we regard the question strictly from an English point of view. England, as a maritime nation, has hitherto relied chiefly on her naval power. She has used her naval power in war chiefly in two ways : 1st. By destroying her enemies' ships, both merchant and others. 2nd. By blockading her enemies' ports. It has been said again and again by the de- fendants of the status quo, that in the right of 66 On International Reform. England to do these two things, her naval power mainly consists. It is urged that if the first were taken away, our navy would have nothing to prey upon ; if the second, it would have nothing to do ; if both were abolished, our navy would be reduced very much into a naval fortification a kind of national body-guard. The Prime Minister (Lord Palmerston) declared emphatically, in reply to Mr. Cobden, that to abolish these maritime rights would be to commit political suicide. Two centuries ago these rights were far more effective and far less injurious than they are now. The right of capturing enemies' ships was at that time a most effective belligerent right to England, for while her naval supremacy was all but undis- puted, the commerce of the world was, to a great extent, carried on by the commercial ships of other nations, and in time of war these were an easy prey. And while it was an effective weapon of warfare in her own hands, it was not a very injurious one when used by other nations against her. For not one-fourth of the commercial ships on the seas belonged to her more than three - fourths belonged to other nations.* But it is not so now. England is said to have as many merchant ships on the ocean as the rest of the world put together. Now that all ships of belligerents are still liable to capture, while enemies' goods in neutral ships * McCulloch's ' Commercial Dictionary,' under Amsterdam, 37. Inadequacy of War. 67 are no longer liable to capture, it is plain that in case of our going to war higher rates of insurance would be charged on the cargoes of our ships as compared with those of neutral ones, and that this fact alone would in great measure cripple our shipping interest without a blow being struck. Our ships would probably either lie idle in our clocks, be transferred into neutral hands, or pursue their wonted voyages with less paying cargoes and under risk of capture. A greater blow to our shipping interest than this could hardly be conceived. And if the right of capturing enemies' ships is becoming more and more injurious to ourselves, it is also becoming less and less effective as a belligerent weapon in our hands as against other nations. For if on the outbreak of war our enemies carry on (as they must do) their commerce in neutral ships, our navy will have no right to touch their commerce at all. Of what use then to us will this suicidal right be ? Its effectiveness as a belli- gerent weapon is evidently gone. It is surely a pity that its power of injuring ourselves should be permitted to remain. It certainly looks like a suicidal policy to persist in wearing a double-edged weapon, whose blunted edge is presented to our enemies and the sharp edge turned in against ourselves ! And the same may, to a great extent, be said 68 On International Reform. of the right of blockading an enemy's ports. It is easy to show that this also as a belligerent right has become more and more injurious to neutrals and less and less efficient as a warlike weapon to belligerents ; and especially so in the case of England. It is admitted by both opponents and defenders of what are called commercial blockades, that all nations except England are willing, nay anxious, that commercial blockades should be abolished; the advocates of their abolition urging the injury suffered by neutral nations from the practice. The defenders of commercial blockades retort, that of course all other nations must delight in their abolition, because it would be tantamount to disarming England of the most powerful weapon whereby she has hitherto maintained her maritime supremacy. It is somewhat strange, certainly, that the only nation anxious to keep up the right of blockading an enemy's coast should be England, the one nation (with the exception, perhaps, of Holland) which of all the nations of the earth would suffer most seriously from the blockade of the ports of other countries, and could not possibly survive for long a blockade of her own ! As was shown in a former chapter, England and Holland are many times more dependent upon foreign commerce than any other nation. To England and Holland alone of all nations would Inadequacy of War. 69 a strict blockade be absolutely and speedily ruinous. Other nations Russia, Belgium, Austria, Prussia, the United States, and perhaps France have within themselves more of the necessaries of life than they themselves require, and could, therefore, endure an endless blockade ; but Eng- land and Holland cut off from foreign supplies of food must starve in a year or two, and suffer grievous privation and misery before even many months of isolation were over. Finally, as the dependence of nations on inter- national commerce increases, the injury inflicted by commercial blockades must obviously increase also. And now as to the growing inefficiency of the right of blockade as a belligerent weapon. There are very few countries now which can be blockaded. The increased railway communication between nations has opened out many new channels whereby nations blockaded on their shores may yet carry on all needful commerce by land and through other nations' ports. Again, that certainly is not an effective weapon which wounds the wielder of it more than the enemy upon whom the blow is struck. And yet in many cases the right of blockade must be so in the hands of England. For were England and the United States to go to war (which God forbid!) the blockade of the ports of the United States would cut off from her the supply of a few luxuries, 70 On International Reform. while it would cut off from England both corn and cotton in the midst of the inevitable expenses and trials of a state of war ! There can be no doubt that however destructive a weapon the right of blockade may be in certain cases, yet, against some nations at least, it is in our hands so inefficient, that in case of actual war we should be glad enough to let it lie idle in its scabbard. It is not proposed here to discuss the different plans which have been suggested to prevent the injury to commerce which results from the exer- cise of these self-destructive belligerent rights. Suffice it to say that whatever plans have been proposed agree in attempting partially to disarm maritime war, and that the only argument of any weight raised against the principle involved in them is, that the more you disarm the more you destroy the efficiency of war ! It is alleged that it is of no use to destroy the efficiency of war so long as it is the only mode whereby nations can maintain their rights. And here the controversy rests. In the mean- time we enter into commercial treaties, and become more and more dependent upon the maintenance of international peace and justice. We keep up a kind of see-saw between additional fortifications on the one hand and reduced military expenditure on the other hand, as the counsels of one or the other political party happen to prevail. Twenty- five millions of hard-earned money slip through Inadequacy of War. 71 our fingers each passing year to maintain a system acknowledged to be utterly powerless as a protection from the evils cast upon us by the quarrels of others, and becoming less and less effective as a means of promptly and justly settling our own. 72 CHAPTER II. I. ON THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN LYNCH LAW AND POSITIVE LAW. IN proceeding now to the most important part of the argument contained in these pages that part of it in which the gist of the whole of it may be said to lie it is very needful that it should be guarded, at the onset, from doubt or confusion arising from the want of clearly understood terms. It will readily be granted that there is a clear and marked distinction between a condition of society in which private individuals ' take the law into their own hands ' and ' do themselves justice] by resort to what in common language we call LYNCH LAW,* and a condition in which an efficient system of POSITIVE LAW is firmly established, by resort to which individuals obtain justice and maintain their rights. Nor can it be denied that there is a distinction equally clear and marked between a condition of international society in which nations ' take the * ' Lynch Law. Punishment inflicted by private individuals without the forms of law.' (Webster.) International Lynch Law. 73 law into their own hands ' and ' do themselves justice ' by resort to what may very fairly be called International Lynch Law, and a condition of international society in which the rights of nations are defined and guarded by a system of Positive International Law. The analogy between civil and international society in this particular, as in others, may not be perfect throughout ; but in all that constitutes the essence of Lynch Law on the one hand and Positive Law on the other hand, the prevalence of the one or the other, in international no less than in civil society, is a fact often witnessed and readily understood. It is apprehended, e.g., that no one will deny that the state of early feudal society in which private wars were carried on by feudal chieftains, was marked to that extent at least by the prevalence of Lynch Law. 4 Because (writes Guizot) the system of judicial guarantees was vicious and powerless; because no one had faith therein, and cared not to have recourse to them ; in a word, in default of something better, men did themselves justice; they protected them- selves? (History of Civilisation, iii. p. 179.) That is to say, in default of an adequate legal judicial system they resorted to Lynch Law to maintain their rights. And so, I apprehend, it can- not any more be denied that a state of international society in which, in default of international positive 74 On International Reform. law, nations ' did themselves justice ' and protected themselves, would be a state of international society marked to that extent at least by the prevalence of what would be fairly called International Lynch Law. And the analogy may be pushed one step further. The prevalence of a common code of morality or of commonly recognised rules of action tempering the harshness of private war between feudal chiefs would not in itself be considered as changing its radical character. So long as feudal chieftains continued, under that code of morality, to do themselves justice and take the law into their own hands, Lynch Law, it would still be said, pre- vailed, though to a less licentious extent and under a somewhat mitigated form. It was so in fact, for (continues M. Guizot) 4 Private warfare and judicial combat became established institutions, regulated according to fixed principles and with more minutely deter- mined forms even than those of the pacific process. .... Men at this period had recourse to force : it was force which was to decide the question, but they desired to introduce into its judgment as much regularity, as much equity as it would allow of (p. 182). And so, in international affairs, the mere fact that rules of international morality were commonly recognised by nations, and that war between nations had become an established in- stitution, regulated according to fixed principles, would not change the radical character of Interna- International Lynch Law. 75 tional Lynch Law. If, having no other method of redressing their wrongs, nations had direct recourse to force, taking the law into their own hands and doing themselves justice, it would be Lynch Law which still decided international disputes, although nations might have tried to introduce into its prac- tice as much regularity, as much equity as it would allow of. Hence, though it may be a matter of question whether the term Lynch Law be an elegant or a classical term to apply to the practice of nations or of men ' taking the law into their own hands,' 'doing themselves justice,' and protecting them- selves, in default of adequate legal and judi- cial institutions, it must, I think, be admitted that the term, if it applies to the case of the one, applies equally to the case of the other. In neither can the existence of commonly accepted rules of mor- ality or of humanity tempering some of its harshness radically change the character of what in its essence is Lynch Law. Such being the distinction in principle between Lynch Law and Positive Law, there remains the question of fact, how far International Lynch Law is still prevalent in international society; and how far it has in fact been supplanted by the institution of positive international law. 76 On International Reform. II. THE ATTEMPT OF GKOTIUS AND HIS FOLLOWERS TO REFORM INTERNATIONAL MORALITY. IN a former chapter it was pointed out that modern international history dates from the esta- blishment of the modern idea of a nation from the period when the idea of universal dominion gave place to that of territorial sovereignty, and nations became attached, as it were, to the countries inhabited by them. It will readily be seen that so long as any trace of the old idea of universal dominion lingered in the minds of nations or their rulers, international relations must of necessity have been so inextricably entangled and confused, the asserted rights of one nation so utterly inconsistent with the rights of every other, that anything like an organised inter- national system was impossible. While princes laid fanciful claim to one another's thrones, and formed and broke off alliances simply when it suited their own selfish schemes, no matter how many solemn treaties were thereby broken or how much unjust injury inflicted, Lynch Law was not only the only law actually in force between nations, but also the only law possible. Any adequate examination into the state of in- ternational affairs during the 16th century the age immediately preceding that of Grotius would make it clear at once that European nations had Inadequacy of the Present System. 77 by no means emerged fully from the transition period of international history. It would show that while, on the one hand, their idea of sovereignty nominally was the modern territorial idea, yet in practice they aimed at something much more ex- tended and indefinite than any mere sovereignty over their own immediate kingdom. And whatever improvement may have taken place in the interval, the unbridled extent to which Lynch Law was carried in the age of Grotius the founder of the present international system was, he tells us himself, the evil to correct which he wrote his treatise De Jure Belli ac Pads. It was one of the ' weighty reasons ' why he wrote it. ' I observed (he writes) throughout the Christian world a licen- tiousness in regard to war which even barbarous nations ought to be ashamed of: a running to arms upon very frivolous or rather no occasions, which being once taken up there remained no longer any reverence for right either divine or human, just as if from that time men were autho- rised and firmly resolved to commit all manner of crimes without restraint.' (Preliminary Discourse, De Jur. Bel. ac Pac.) He clearly saw that it was by law of nature (and that in the proper sense as we have defined it) that men were driven to form social relations. ' The Author of nature was pleased (he says) that every man in particular should be weak of him- self, and in want of many things necessary for G 78 On International Reform. living commodiously to the end that we might more eagerly affect Society.' He saw clearly, also, that owing to this inter- dependence of individuals, no social community can be preserved, not even a society of Robbers, without some respect for justice and right. And he saw, too, that the same principle applied to the intercourse as well of nations as of men. The necessity of the practice of justice between citizens is visible (he said) to all; 'but great States that seem to have within themselves all things neces- sary for their defence and well-being, do not (he continues) seem to some to stand in need of that virtue.' But although, as we have pointed out, the nations were passing through the self-subsistent stage of national life, yet Grotius could see clearly enough that, nevertheless, ' there is no State so strong or well-provided but what may sometimes stand in need of foreign assistance, either in the business of commerce or to repel the joint forces of confederated nations.' And from this he argued consistently that ' if there is no community which can be preserved without some sort of right, as Aristotle proved by that remarkable instance of robbers, certainly the society of mankind or of several nations can- not be without it.' Starting, then, from the fact that there existed only to a very partial extent indeed any system of Inadequacy of the Present System. 79 positive international law, he proceeded, in the first place, to lay down what, upon that assump- tion and under those circumstances, nations were bound in natural justice to do and leave undone in their intercourse with one another. ' The leading object of Grotius and of his imme- diate disciples and successors (writes Wheaton) in the science of which he was the founder seems to have been 1st, to lay down those rules of justice which would be binding on men living in a social state, independently of any positive laws of human institution, or, as it is commonly expressed, living together in a state of nature ; and 2nd, to apply those rules, under the name of Natural Law, to the mutual relations of separate communities living in a similar state with respect to each other.' (Wheaton, I. p. 33.) Vattel also rested upon this fundamental prin- ciple the rules of international natural justice and morality which it was his chief aim to promul- gate. ' Nations,' he says, ' being composed of men naturally free and independent, and who, before the establishment of civil societies, lived together in a state of nature, nations, or sovereign states, are to be considered as so many free persons living together in the state of nature.' And he thus expresses the object of his book : ' In this treatise it will appear in what manner States, as such, ought to regulate all their actions.' G 2 80 On International Reform. It will be seen, therefore, that those rules and maxims of natural justice which Grotius and his followers promulgated as binding upon nations in foro conscientice were in reality far more a code of international morality than of international law, in the commonly received meaning of the term law. Nor did Grotius or Vattel confuse the system of morality which it was their chief aim to pro- mulgate, with what they recognised as a distinct thing altogether a system of positive law. We shall see this perfectly clearly when we come to speak more fully of their views with reference to the latter. Nor do even those who still cling to the phrase international law as applied to what are merely rules of international morality deny the existence of the radical distinction between them and the enactments of positive law. It does not therefore seem necessary to bring forward any further authorities in support of an opinion which, when fairly looked into, can hardly be disputed. It will be seen that in the preceding pages I have purposely given the object and opinions of Grotius and others in the words of Wheaton, so that the reader may judge for himself whether I have unconsciously misrepresented them to suit the purposes of my argument. It is fair, however, to say that in the paragraph in which Dr. Philli- more alludes to this subject, he argues that the Inadequacy of the Present System. 81 rules of international morality are in a sense inter- national laws. But if I mistake not, the evident dislike of the Doctor to the term international morality, and the reasons why he thinks it of im- portance to maintain the use of the term ' inter- national law ' for what he does not deny is merely moral doctrine, must, in itself, tend to support the view urged in this chapter. The modern international system grew up while the nations were still passing through the self- subsistent stage of national life, when as yet the need had not arisen, or was not felt, for a complete system of positive international law. A thorough reform of international morality was in their day the pressing need of international society, and this reformation was the great work which Grotius and his successors attempted, and as a matter of fact have in great measure accomplished. III. GROTIUS AND HIS FOLLOWERS ADMITTED THE EXISTENCE AND NECESSITY OF ' POSITIVE ' INTERNATIONAL LAW. It has been seen that the great work which Grotius proposed to himself, and so successfully achieved, was the promulgation of sound rules of international morality. But did Grotius mean that international reform should stop with the attainment of this object? 82 On International Reform. Was there never to be any positive law between nations, practically regulating international action, in accordance with the general principles of inter- national morality? Puffendorf seems to have thought that positive law would be out of place between nations. Speaking of the rules of international intercourse observed by tacit consent among civilised nations the only approach to positive law which existed in his day he remarks : ' If one engaged in a lawful war shall neglect them and profess that he will not be bound by such restraints, provided that what is contrary to them may be rightly done according to the law of nature [i.e. natural justice], he is guilty of no other sin but a sort of unskilfulness in not adjusting his proceedings to the nice models of those who reckon war in the number of the liberal studies, as a gladiator is accused of inexpertness when he wounds his antagonist otherwise than by rules of art. Whoever, therefore, wages war in a just cause may slight these formalities at pleasure, and govern himself purely by law of nature. . . Nor have those men any good reason of complaint who censure this doctrine as a notion by which the security, the interest, and the safety of nations are robbed of their surest guards and defence. . . The observance of the law of nature affords them a much more sacred support one which whilst they enjoy they have little need of inferior methods Inadequacy of the Present System. 83 of protection.' (Puffendorf, bk. II. c. iii. s. 23; p. 151.) Puffendorf thus clearly denies not only the existence, but also the need, of any positive inter- national laws. The laws of national justice i.e. of international morality he held to be the only and sufficient rule of international action. Positive international laws would be an ' inferior method of protection.' But not so Grotius. In an age when there were hardly any positive laws of nations clearly denned and in force, he clearly asserted their existence and the need of their existence. He distinguished, more or less clearly, between the rules of inter- national morality (jus naturae} and what he called laws of nations (jus gentium]. 4 Grotius (writes Wheaton) considers the law of nations as a positive institution, deriving its authority from the positive consent of all or the greater part of nations, which he supposes to be united in a social compact for the purpose.' And again, ' Grotius states that the jus gentium acquires its obligatory force from the positive consent of all nations, or at least of several.' Thus, then, the laws of international morality of natural justice which he wrote his book to define and promulgate T were not in themselves, in his view, positive ' laws of nations,' unless or until they were adopted by the express or implied consent of most civj]i.ed nations. Where rules of 84 On International Reform. international conduct were thus adopted, he con- sidered that they became, as between those na- tions, positive laws, whether they were consistent or not with the laws of natural justice. In some instances some nations recognised different posi- tive laws of this kind from those recognised by others, and it was evidently his desire, in promul- gating sound views of natural justice, so to in- fluence the usages of civilised nations as to make them comport with his own sound views, and so in the long run to mould thereby the positive law of nations which the common usage of nations creates. Bynkershoek, rejecting the view of Puffeiidorf, also held with Grotius that the usage of nations was the basis of the law of nations. In a passage quoted by Wheaton, he says that 4 the law of nations is that which is observed in accordance with the light of reason between na- tions, if not among all, at least certainly among the greater part, and those the most civilised.' And so also Vattel, in speaking of the positive law of nations, expresses himself thus : ' When a custom or usage is generally esta- blished, either between all the civilised nations of the world, or only between those of a certain con- tinent, as of Europe for example, or between those who have a more frequent intercourse with one another ; if that custom is in its own nature indif- ferent, and much more if it be useful and rea- Inadequacy of the Present System. 85 sonable, it becomes obligatory on the nations in question, who are considered as having given their consent to it, and are bound to observe it towards each other as long as they have not expressly declared their resolution of not observing it in future.' (Vattel, Ixv.) And he remarks further that the positive laws of nations i.e. those laws which proceed from the will of nations are of three kinds : ' the voluntary, from their presumed consent ; the conventional, from an express consent ; and the customary, from tacit consent.' And he concludes his remarks by laying down the rule that while nations, in examining what is their own duty, should consult the laws of natural justice which are always obligatory in the con- science, in examining what they may demand of other nations they should consult the positive law of nations. Finally, Wheaton adds his own authority to that of the earlier jurists in the following words : ' The international law of Christendom began to be fixed about the time of Grotius, when the combined influence of religion, chivalry, the feudal system, and commercial and literary intercourse had blended together .the nations of Europe into one great family. This law does not merely consist of the principles of natural justice applied to the conduct of States considered as moral beings. It may, indeed, have a remote foundation of this 86 On International Reform. sort, but the immediate visible basis on which the public law of Europe, and of the American nations which have sprung from the European stock, has been erected, are the customs, usages, and conven- tions observed by that portion of the human race in their mutual intercourse.' (Wheaton, I. 51.) We arrive, therefore, at the clear result that in- ternational jurists, from Grotius to Wheaton, have, with but few exceptions, made a more or less clear distinction between the rules of natural justice or of international morality on the one hand, and posi- tive international law on the other. The former they called the law of nature, the latter the law of nations. They granted, therefore, in principle the neces- sity of positive international law, and themselves aimed at the correction and extension of whatever of positive international law existed in their own times. IV. WHAT POSITIVE INTERNATIONAL LAW EXISTS IS VERY INADEQUATE, AND INTERNATIONAL LYNCH LAW STILL PREVAILS. While thus the greatest international authorities may be cited in support of the necessity of positive international law, and its partial existence in their times as well as in our own, yet we must by no means jump to the conclusion that because of the Inadequacy of the Present System. 87 partial existence of positive international law, the prevalence of international Lynch Law has been practically put an end to. It remains to be shown whether it is so fully established as really to supersede the resort on the part of nations to Lynch Law, as really to make it no longer needful for nations ' to take the law into their own hands and do themselves justice.' And again it requires consideration whether much of what is really established usage on the part of nations be not analogous to those usages by which private war was in feudal times regulated and its harshness in some measure tempered, rather than to what ought to be regarded as really positive law. In the first place, with some marked exceptions such as the declaration of the slave trade to be piracy, and the declaration of Paris of 1856, to both of which the express positive consent of all nations bound thereby has been solemnly given, it may well be questioned whether the rules of inter- national action be sufficiently clearly defined to admit of their being regarded as to the full extent at least positive laws. In the second place, the absence of any judicial or authoritative mode of interpreting these con- suetudinary laws of nations gives them a vagueness which at once distinguishes them from the un- written law of civil society. The common law of England, e.g., is for the most part clearly defined by judicial precedent, which giving the positive 88 On International Reform. sanction of the State to the point of law decided, from time to time supplies almost as fully as would special enactment the positive element which cha- racterises the common law of England. In the third place, however fully they may be thought by some to possess the characteristics of positive law, they are analogous to the maxims by which private war was regulated in feudal times in this essential particular, that instead of providing a legal and judicial substitute for Lynch Law, i.e. for the system of each nation ' doing itself justice and taking the law into its own hands,' they rather organise this system and seek to introduce into its practice ' as much equity as it will admit of.' Under these laws what is in fact international private war has become an institution regulated by fixed principles, just as much as feudal private war did ages ago, instead of it being superseded by legal and judicial institutions. Hence, therefore, the most that can be said of a large portion of international law whether, strictly speaking, positive law or not is that, like the old feudal code of private war, it tends to temper the harshness of Lynch Law without superseding its practice. And lastly, even with regard to the declaration of Paris itself, so far as there exists no other method of interpretation but that of each nation judging for itself what it means, and so far as there exists no other method of enforcing it but that of each Inadequacy of the Present System. 89 nation taking the law into its own hands and doing itself justice by its own military and naval power so far Lynch Law still in our own times prevails between nations ; causing cotton famines, destroying peaceful commerce, and thereby robbing thousands and hundreds of thousands, and it maybe millions, of innocent citizens of even neutral nations of the wages on which they are dependent for their daily bread ! This is what, I trust, the terrible evils of the pre- sent war will startle the British public into seeing ; for look at it as we will, I cannot see a single loop- hole through which we can escape from the most unpalatable truth. The American War will not have been an un- mixed evil if it open our eyes to the injury which the pursuit of right by the harsh methods of inter- national Lynch Law inflicts, and is always likely to inflict, upon friend and foe alike ; and especially if at the same time it force us to recognise the utter inadequacy of those methods, even with all the refinements of modern warfare, as means of promptly bringing to a just or an unjust conclusion an international dispute. Were the power all on one side, no doubt it might seem to be otherwise. In such a case, a dis- pute may be forced to a conclusion at any moment by the nation whose brute force is superior. The weaker Power, whether in the right or the wrong, will yield, though it may be under protest. But 90 On International Reform. no end of justice is gained. The dispute has not been finally settled. The embers may smoulder for awhile, but it is only to break out again, when further fuel is added, into a far stronger flame. The inadequacy of the present international system lies therefore, it is clear, in a far more radical defect than can be reformed by any mere alteration of the rules of maritime warfare. It has been proposed to abolish those usages of war which are most injurious to neutral nations. The only strong argument which has been relied on against this reform rests on the fact that, to disarm war of its most disastrous and dangerous weapons, would be to make it a still less efficient means of obtain- ing redress for international wrongs than it is, and to render it a pastime which, in the words of Lord Palmerston, might be ' indulged in for ever without coming to any result.' It is, in truth, inadequate enough already, and its inadequacy lies in the fact that Lynch Law never is, nor can be, an adequate means for the attainment of the ends of justice in a complicated state of international or any other society. No reformation of the practice of international Lynch Law can, therefore, solve the international problem upon the solution of which the common weal of nations is becoming more and more dependent. As was remarked at the outset, the problem is a double one. The present system of international Lynch Law is both inadequate as a mode of obtaining inter- Inadequacy of the Present System. 91 national justice, and also injurious to other nations. The international problem requiring solution is how to provide a more adequate security for inter- national justice which shall at the same time be less injurious to the interests of nations. In short, it may be possible to make the practice of international Lynch Law either less injurious to neutral nations or more effective in the hands of belligerent nations ; but to make it both a harmless and an effective means of attaining the ends of inter- national justice is a task transcending human skill. V. THE INTERNATIONAL REFORM NOW REQUIRED IS THE SUBSTITUTION OF A LEGAL AND JUDICIAL SYSTEM FOR INTERNATIONAL LYNCH LAW. In a previous section the fact was pointed out that modern international jurists deduced their international maxims by analogy from the prin- ciples which would prevail between individuals in the analogous stage of social society, i.e. in the absence of organised civil and judicial institutions. I wish now to press the analogy between social and international life a little further. Since the time of Grotius the ages have rolled on, the shadow on the international dial has ad- vanced ; the state of international society is no longer analogous to a state of civil society with_ out civil and judicial institutions, but to one 92 On International Reform. more advanced. International society has passed since the age of Grotius into another and more advanced stage, and it is therefore necessary to compare with it a corresponding and more advanced stage of civil society, if we wish to draw the true present analogy between the two. It will readily be admitted that a state of society which is marked by the absence of a civil and judicial system, or, in other words, by the preva- lence of Lynch Law between men, is only a very temporary stage of the life of a civilised nation. - And what is that point in social history at which the system of Lynch Law breaks down, and the necessity for a civil and judicial system to take its place, becomes obvious and pressing? Surely it is that in which it is found in practice that the resort to Lynch Law is not only a very burdensome and inefficient remedy to the ag- grieved party, but also hazardous to the lives and interests of others. When population is thinly scattered, and men have little or no communication with any but their distant next-door neighbours, they may wear their swords and fight out their quarrels in a summary manner without much danger to others. But were two citizens to fight out their quarrel in the crowded market, to the danger and actual damage of peaceable passers-by, it would be evident enough that some more harmless mode of settling the disputes of citizens than this must be provided. Inadequacy of the Present System. 93 We see in our own past history how, as the towns increased in population, and more and more citizens became dependent upon the peaceful prosecution of internal trade, the necessity arose for the general disarmament of citizens which has been so completely effected. And we see in the growth of modern colonies the same ne- cessity arise, whether it be in the gold diggings of California, Australia, or British Columbia. The scum of civilised population collects in a whirlpool of excitement, Lynch Law for a while prevails. But this stage of colonial history is of short duration; with the increased population, a civil government arises, and the district which before contained only a handful of independent inhabi- tants, becomes, by the force of moral gravitation, a civilised state. As we analyse the present state of international society, we find what is neither more nor less than the practice of international Lynch Law still to a great extent prevailing between nations, closely resembling in practice, and altogether identical in principle, with the state of Lynch Law which in a barbarous stage of society subsisted between indi- viduals. We find, further, that as Lynch Law between individuals has always and everywhere been found to be inimical to private trade, so is international Lynch Law now found, as the Hanse Towns found it eight hundred years ago, to be inimical to international commerce. To H 94 On International Reform. carry the . analogy one step further, it is sub- mitted, that as the growth of commercial enter- prise, and the consequent complication of in- dividual rights and relations necessitated the gradual substitution of civil law and a judicial system between individuals, so must the growth of international commerce and the consequent complication of international rights and relations eventually necessitate the gradual substitution of positive international law and an essentially judicial system between nations. Analogies cannot, I am perfectly aware, be pushed too far. It does not follow, in the least, that the law and the judicial system should be of the same type in the one case as in the other ; it does riot follow, in the least, that the change will be brought about by the same steps or the same means ; but I trust I shall be able to show that, being necessary, it is not Utopian to aim at its gradual accomplishment, and that some tentative steps have already been taken in the right direction. PART III. ON THE NATURE OF THE INTERNATIONAL REFORM REQUIRED BY THE INCREASING INTERDEPENDENCE OF NATIONS :- I. IN INTERNATIONAL LAW. II. IN ITS INTEKPKETATION. III. IN ITS ENFORCEMENT. H 2 97 CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY THE THREE BRANCHES OF THE SUBJECT. IN proceeding now to discuss more fully the nature of that international reform which, as shown in the .preceding chapters, in the onward course of civilisation is imperatively needed, the subject naturally divides itself into three branches. 1st, with reference to the Law. 2nd, with reference to its interpretation. 3rd, with reference to its enforcement. It divides itself naturally into these three branches, because it is an essential difference in these three particulars which constitutes the real distinction between the uncivilised state of society wherein Lynch Law prevails and the more civilised state of society in which it has been supplanted by a civil and judicial system. Thus Grotius quotes Thucydides to show that a civil power a state is a body which has its own laws, tribunals, and magistrates. A state of society wherein Lynch Law prevails to the full extent is a state of society so un- organised, so uncivilised, as to possess no laws, tribunals, and magistrates a state of society in 98 On International Reform. which each man's own will, whether moral or depraved, is his only recognised law; his own judgment, whether sound or biassed, his only recognised judge; his own arm, whether weak or powerful, his only weapon of redress. A civilised state is a society so far organised as to possess established laws, judicial tribunals for their interpretation, and magistrates to enforce them. And the essential distinction between a system of Lynch Law and a civil and judicial system lies therefore in the point, whether the individual or the society declares, interprets, and enforces the laws whereby social intercourse is regulated. 99 CHAPTER 11. International Law. I. THE NECESSITY FOR A MORE COMPLETE- SYSTEM OF POSITIVE INTERNATIONAL LAW. IN mi uncivilised state of society wherein Lynch Law prevails to the full extent i.e. wherein no positive civil law exists men take upon themselves to define what is right and lawful for themselves according to their own notions, instead of obeying a uniform code of laws mutually recognised as equally binding upon all who are members of the same civil society. It has further been shown that in principle the case is not altered by the fact that, owing to the growth of civilisation, a uniform code of morality is accepted by each as binding upon his own conscience. From the fact that each is bound by his own conscience, it follows as a consequence that no man can be bound by that of any other man. Hence each man, when a common code of morality exists, no less than in its absence, takes upon himself to define what is right and lawful for himself instead of obeying a uniform code of laws 100 On International Reform. mutually recognised as equally binding upon him- self and his fellow-subjects. And this analogy holds good of international society. The fact that, to a large extent, nations have accepted the Grotian international code of morality as binding in foro conscientice upon civilised nations does not, in itself, change the essential character of international society. To the extent to which each nation still takes upon itself to define what is right and lawful to itself instead of obeying a uniform code of positive law, mutually recognised by civilised nations as binding upon themselves and their neighbours, to that extent International Lynch Law is the only law in force between nations. To what extent is this the case ? With a few marked exceptions, such as the De- claration of Paris of 1856 and the declaration that the slave trade shall be piracy, the maxims which now regulate international relations are, in fact, far more analogous to rules of morality binding in foro conscientice than to the enactment of positive law. To make the very most of it, they have only partially been converted, under the sanction of long international usage, into positive law. It is true that some principles have undoubtedly become established and generally recognised by almost invariable usage, but it is no less true that in other particulars, within certain limits, each nation holds its own views according to its own In International Law. 101 supposed interests, and a different view from, its neighbours when their interests are supposed to be divergent. There is, in many cases, just as much difference of opinion and divergence of policy as there is apparent contrariety of interest. Now the position advanced is this : That while the absence of positive law was a tolerable and necessary evil w r hile nations were passing through the self-subsistent stage of national life and had very little mutual intercourse, it is becoming an intolerable and unnecessary evil now that nations are, one after another, passing out of the self- subsistent stage of national life into the most dependent one ; and now that the adoption of a free trade policy by one nation after another is more and more blending the interests of all nations in one, entangling the threads of their national prosperity into an international skein. The position advanced is this : That inevi- tably, in the present complicated state of inter- national society, the continued prevalence of Lynch Law in this particular does not, and in the future more and more will not and cannot, work ; and that the international system requires, in order that it may work, the adoption by civilised nations of a just and uniform system of positive inter- national law. I do not say that necessarily an exhaustive code must be forthwith framed, to be taken at a gulp by all civilised nations far from it ; but I do 102 On International Reform. say that one great and pressing branch of inter- national reform is, beyond all doubt, the gradual and persistent substitution, as time rolls on, of uniform and clearly defined and accepted positive international laws on one question after another, for the international maxims of the jurists. Nor will this position, I confidently trust, be disputed. It has been, I think, sufficiently shown to be strictly in accordance with the spirit and even the express declarations of Grotius and his more recent expounders. I will content myself with adding to their weighty authority the still more weighty authority of the modern solemn declaration of all the civilised powers of the world, without a single exception, to the general principle involved. The following is the preamble of the l Declaration of Paris, respecting maritime law, signed by the plenipotentiaries of Great Britain, Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia, and Turkey, assembled in Congress at Paris, April 16, 1856 ' : It declares : ' That maritime law in time of war has long been the subject of deplorable disputes. ' That the uncertainty of the law in such a matter gives rise to differences of opinion, which may occasion serious difficulties and even conflicts. 1 That it is consequently advantageous to In International Law. 103 establish a uniform doctrine on so important a point.' The Declaration which follows this preamble (now adopted by forty-six civilised Powers) estab- lishes as between those Powers something like a uniform code of international law regarding the rights of neutrals, and is, therefore, a step precisely in the right direction. The Americans, indeed, refused to concur in this Declaration, but Mr. Seward, in his correspondence in reference to its adoption, paid nevertheless a just tribute to the Tightness and pureness of its object. ' The Declaration of Paris is the joint act of forty-six great and enlightened Powers designing to alleviate the evils of maritime war, and promote the first interest of humanity, which is peace.' (Seward, September 7, 1861.) And Earl Russell stated that ' Her Majesty's Government, in concurring in this Declaration, wished to establish a doctrine for all time, with a view to lessen the horrors of war all over the globe. The instructions sent out to Lord Lyons prove' (he said) 'the sincerity of their wish to give permanence and fixity of principles to this part of the Law of Nations.' (Russell, August 28, 1861.) The general principle expressed so forcibly in the above quotations, and applied by the Declara- tion of Paris to one portion of international law in particular, is precisely the principle urged in this 104 On International Reform. chapter, and it can hardly require further authority or argument to support it. II. ARBITRATION NO PROPER SUBSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW. But inasmuch as the proposal to submit inter- national disputes to arbitration has sometimes been represented as a kind of Morison's Pill to cure all international diseases, it may be well to point out clearly that arbitration (however good as a merely temporary and exceptional expedient, failing international law) is contrary to all sound political principles as a permanent substitute for law, and as such it will not work. In the first place, it should never be forgotten that the great end of law is not to decide, but to prevent disputes; that for every dispute which British civil law, e.g., decides there are thousands of cases in which disputes are prevented from arising by its certainty and clearness. But arbi- tration in itself is powerless to prevent disputes ; it only extends to the adjustment of disputes which have already arisen. Arbitration, therefore, as a system fails in ful- filling the main end in view. 2ndly. In another, and scarcely less important particular, arbitration, from its very nature, must In International Law. 105 fail as a substitute for law. It is under just laws, well denned, and clearly recognised beforehand, and under these alone, that the intricate entangle- ments of interests can safely exist, without which the advantages of civilised life cannot be realised. In the absence of such laws men's relations to one another are necessarily kept more simple, and men refrain from entering into transactions which otherwise they would enter into daily without the least misgiving, and to mutual advantage. 3rdly. Sublime as the theory of simple justice, dispensed by the untrammeled award of an honest and upright arbiter may be, in practice it would afford no guarantee of individual liberty. It would be open to all the objections which lie against the principle of legislating for a special case after its occurrence. It lacks the guarantee of perfect impartiality which constitutes the very essence of laws framed for all cases alike, without any reference either to any particular case which actually occurs, or to the particular parties to a dispute. Consequently, no one in his senses would bind himself beforehand to submit all questions of dispute in which he may become involved to the arbitration even of the best of his friends. It would be to make another man's conscience, and not his own, the guide of his actions. And so, in international affairs, there are cases where the rights are so plain and the issue so 10G On International Reform. important that it would be folly to hazard the result of an arbitration. Thus Yattel, whilst strongly recommending a resort to arbitration before an appeal to the sword in doubtful cases which do not involve essential points, expressly distinguishes from them cases of dispute in which the ' essential rights ' or the ' safety of the nation' is involved (Vattel, 278-9), and he brings forward the instance of the Swiss. who have had the precaution in their alliances to ' agree beforehand on the manner in which their disputes were to be submitted to arbitration ' a * wise precaution which has not a little contributed to maintain the Helvetic Republic in that flourish- ing state which secures her liberty and renders her respectable throughout Europe.' ' And yet the Swiss] he continues, ' on occasions when their liberty was menaced refused to submit their dispute to arbitration: ( Vattel, 278-80.) Nor is it, moreover, in the least degree likely that nations will bind themselves to submit their disputes to arbitration. The Plenipotentiaries of the great nations of Europe, assembled in Congress at Paris, though they had unanimously and without scruple agreed to bind themselves, without appeal, by four clearly defined and inexorable laws regarding the rights of maritime powers in time of war ; with equal un- animity guarded their recommendation that States between which misunderstandings should arise. In International Law. 107 should, before appealing to arms, have recourse to the good offices of a friendly power, with the decla- ration that it should not amount to an engagement to do so. The Earl of Clarendon proposed the resolution, as ' calculated to afford to the maintenance of peace a chance of duration hereafter, without prejudice, however, to the independence of Governments.'' Count Walewski supported the resolution, conceiving it ' to be fully in accordance with the tendencies of our epoch,' while it ' would not in any way fetter the free action of Governments.'' Count Buol did not hesitate to concur in it, ' though he could not make in the name of his Court an absolute engagement calculated to limit the independence of the Austrian Cabinet.' And the Plenipotentiaries did not hesitate to give it the ' most extended application,' because ' it could not in any case oppose limits to the liberty of judgment, of which no power can divest itself in questions affecting its dignity.' Such was the jealousy of the great powers of anything approaching to an engagement to resort to even so harmless a course as the mediation of a friendly power (for there was nothing said about arbitration at this Congress) before resorting to force. What, then, would be the jealousy with which any scheme would be met for referring inter- national disputes to arbitration? 108 On International Reform. We may well conclude from the result of the Congress of Paris of 1856 that the whole range of international law may probably be reformed and fixed, by similar declarations to that upon maritime law, before nations are prepared to bind themselves to refer their disputes to arbitration. Hence we conceive that it cannot be too clearly kept in view, that good as arbitration may be, and doubtless is, in its proper sphere, as an exceptional resort failing international law, to rest upon it as a permanent substitute for law would be to build upon the sand. It is not needful here to dwell on the subject of ' arbitration ' in its own proper sphere, and to urge its more frequent adoption in cases for the settle- ment of which it is adapted. All that it is need- ful to point out at this stage of the subject is, that arbitration cannot rightly be held out as a permanent substitute for a system of positive and well-defined law. , III. THE LIMITS OF INTERNATIONAL LAW NON-INTERVENTION. Although a sound system of positive interna- tional law may be regarded as essential to the common weal of nations, and as admitting of no such substitute as arbitration, in the present com- plex state of international society, it is, on the In International Law. 109 other hand, important to mark clearly the limits within which the range of positive law must itself be confined, and beyond which nations must be left to act according to their own judgment, without legal or other interference. The range of international law, as well as of individual interference in the affairs of nations, is strictly limited by the doctrine of non-intervention. There is, perhaps, no more encouraging fact in modern international history than the steady ad- vance which has of late been made by nearly all political parties towards the adoption of this doctrine. There is, indeed, a false doctrine of non-interven- tion, based upon a selfish policy, which would stand by and see a weaker power oppressed by a stronger one without interference, because it is not the direct interest of the latter at the moment to interfere. Without saying that a great power like England ought to consider it its business to turn knight- errant and undertake every job of police which wants doing on the seas, a selfish policy may safely be denounced as contrary to the laws of natural justice and international morality, which proclaim the equal rights of all nations, be they weak or strong. The true doctrine of non-intervention rests, not upon the want of direct interest on the part of other nations, but upon the right of international liberty on the part of the nation interfered with. i 110 On International Reform. It rests upon the fact that no nation or compact of nations has by nature a right to interfere with the private aifairs of any other, unless such inter- ference be strictly needful to secure the common weal of nations. It is analogous to the law of civil liberty which denies that any individual or state has a right to meddle with the personal rights of the subject, except so far as is needful to secure the common weal. Were this doctrine of non-in- tervention clearly denned and thoroughly accepted by civilised nations, the province of international law would be wonderfully narrowed and brought into manageable compass. But, if this be the true doctrine of non-interven- tion, it is obvious that the same rules cannot be laid down as the limit of right intervention on the part of individual nations on the one hand, and of inter- national society by its laws on the other. A distinction must clearly be recognised in inter- national affairs analogous to that which exists between the limits of right intervention in the private affairs of individuals, on the part of indi- viduals, on the one hand, and of the State on the other hand. An individual has no right to trespass on his neighbour's property, but the State has a right to make roads and railroads over everyone's property whenever the common weal really requires it. And so an organised international society, if it existed, might probably rightly intervene by its In International Law. Ill laws in some cases, when it would be injurious and wrong for an isolated nation to do so. And as the right of intervention is extended by the organisation of a civil or international society, so also are the corresponding obligations. It is not always the duty of an individual to redress a wrong done even to himself. But it is the duty of a civil society impartially to carry out its laws. And so also of nations and international society. A nation is not bound to act the knight -errant, or even to enforce all its rightful claims against all other nations. But international positive law once clearly established as an international institution, it will become no less the duty of international than of civil society impartially and promptly to main- tain and carry out those laws, as far as the common weal of nations may require it. Hence the great importance of keeping all attempts at international legislation clearly within the just limits of the true doctrine of non-interven- tion, so that they may thoroughly enlist the moral support of the international community. For a law once enacted, which shall infringe unduly the lawful liberty of any nation, must shake the foundations of the whole international fabric. It must entail one of two alternative evils, and probably both. To carry it out would be to per- petrate a legal tyranny. To neglect to put it in force would be to let down the dignity of the law. i 2 112 On International Reform. To attempt to carry it out, and to fail in the attempt, would be to be gored by both horns of the dilemma, and thus it would submit the international system to a double shock. And yet no one has been able to draw with logical exactness the practical limits to right in- tervention on the part of society through its laws, simple as is the theory of non-intervention ex- pressed in general terms. Probably the question no more admits of an universal solution in inter- national than in civil affairs. At all events, it will not be expected that such a solution should be given in this Essay. I shall content myself, therefore, with having urged the expediency of erring, if at all, on the side of non-intervention, rather than running the risk of shaking the whole international fabric by attempts at unwise intervention. IV. THE ACTUAL CONSENT OF NATIONS REQUIRED TO MAKE INTERNATIONAL LAW BINDING. A MAJORITY OF NATIONS CANNOT ENACT LAWS WHICH SHALL BE UNIVERSALLY BINDING. While it may be impossible to give an universal solution to the question where in practice to draw the line of non-intervention, it is not only possible, but absolutely necessary to put practical guards In International Law. 113 upon unjust or undue intervention on the part of society in the affairs of individuals. The only guard, which in practice has proved it- self at all a successful one, is that of obtaining, as nearly as the circumstances of the case will admit, the consent of individuals to the laws which they are bound to obey. But the right of individuals not to be bound by laws to which they have not given their individual consent, is one of those rights which men have in practice always been compelled partially to give up in civil society. They do so on the sound principle that all human association, by law of nature, involves that each individual so associating shall give up so much of his individual liberty as is needful to secure the common end, to attain which the society is formed. The art of civil association consists in obtaining the maximum of common good at the minimum expense of individual rights, so that there may be no waste of the latter. In the case of a nation composed of several millions of people, each individual cannot possibly give his own actual consent to every one of the laws. And hence the exigencies of a civilised nation require the establishment of a sovereign power, capable of making and of enforcing its laws upon all its subjects. And the nearest equivalent to the actual concurrence of all in the acts of the sovereign power which political skill has been able 114 On International Reform. as yet to contrive, is that system of representation and delegation of rights and duties to a compara- tively very small number of men, which is as yet far from perfect either in its theory or practice. Under the civil institutions of the purest re- public, as well as of a constitutional monarchy, individual men necessarily so far give up their individual rights to the majority of their fellow- citizens that they become in fact, as well as in name, subjects obeying a superior power. or govern- ment, which can and does constantly make laws affecting their rights without their individual con- sent to them having been directly obtained or