Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/868

832 HARVARD LAW REVIEW sometimes rendered by a divided court, has almost always been accepted.^ It is important, however, in international disputes, just as it was in quarrels among a primitive people, that where the parties may be reluctant to submit the question in the first place, the pro- cedure and the composition of the court should be fully and pre- cisely regulated. The court and the procedure must be ready; no party must be given an excuse to refuse to submit on account of any doubt as to either of these requisites for the commencement of litigation. The existence of a well-known procedure which pro- vides an honorable way of accommodation may make all the dif- ference between a fight and no fight. When once the fight has been postponed and the dispute submitted to a tribunal, the danger is generally past. In those cases which, for lack of rules by which to decide them, cannot be submitted to a court acting judicially, — and to the practice of early courts suggests that they need not be so numerous as is often supposed, — if submission is once made to a board of conciliators having a settled composition and procedure, their recommendations will seldom be disregarded in the end. That the recommendations of mediators or conciUators have fre- quently failed heretofore, may fairly be attributed to the fact that the mediator has been a single individual or government, and has not had behind it international public opinion, much less any machinery, even imperfect, for bringing such opinion to bear. If the recommendation of the board is not accepted as it stands, it will at least be apt to lead to a settlement. IV An objection to the judicial settlement of international disputes, less urged than formerly, is the alleged impossibiHty of submitting questions which are deemed to affect the "honor or vital interests" of a nation, — terms of a very indefinite scope. To have exempted from the jurisdiction of early courts all disputes affecting the honor or vital interests of the parties would have reduced the courts to nulUties. In the beginning, the sub- mission of any question was more or less a voluntary matter; but 23 Senator Knox, Speech in Senate on League of Nations, March i, 1919. J