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THE GREEN BAG
systems of law within the same political state." He explains the work of amendment of the law which had to precede codification. This was divided into two periods, the first progressive, the second reactionary, the sym pathies of Napoleon being on the whole with the latter. The work was peacefully carried on by a convention in the midst of the excit ing scenes of the French Revolution. Of the results of the work he says: "Two things at any rate the Code has done. It has familiarized all Frenchmen with the principles of the law which they have to ob serve. It has supplied a model which other nations have eagerly and extensively copied. In England the law is ordinarily regarded as something technical, mysterious, not to be understanded of the lay folk. In France the leading provisions of the Codes have become household words. They form the topic of village conversations. Familiarity with them is presupposed in popular literatxire and on the stage." He thinks that the French Codes have ar rested the development of French law in some respects, but rather in the domain of procedure than of substantive law. It has sim plified jurisprudence and facilitated the work of judges, without eliminating the importance of their interpretation, and though at first a degeneration of the system of teaching in French law schools seemed imminent, this tendency has since been avoided. INSURANCE. "Life Insurance: Shall We Have State or Federal Supervision?" by Samuel Bosworth Smith, American Lawyer (V. xiii, p. 372). INTERNATIONAL LAW. In the Journal of the Society of Comparative Legislation (No. xiv, p. 201) Thomas Baty publishes a discussion of "Some Questions in the Law of Neutrality." He deals first with several questions relating to contraband. "The real importance of the subject of contraband at the present day is that it pro vides a loophole to the Declaration of Paris. That declaration, when it made enemy goods free on a neutral ship, included the goods of the enemy government. The temptation is strong to seize them as contraband. It will easily be imagined that a belligerent could see, with more or less composure, a neutral's goods
(not clearly contraband) going to the enemy's country as a mercantile speculation; whilst it is a very different matter to watch such sup plies when actually consigned to the enemy government passing safely on neutral vessels. The old-time belligerent would in many cases simply have seized the cotton, corn, oil, and coal on the plea that it was enemy property: this can no longer be done, and he attempts to seize it as contraband. Probablv the dec laration requires modification: such a course would be preferable to an unsettlement of the accepted general law. It is not certain whether the Russian ukase, subjecting goods forwarded 'aux frais ou a 1'ordre de 1'ennemi' to confiscation, meant to include only goods ordered by the enemy government, as distinct from those ordered by private individuals. If it is so limited, it forms the basis of a reason able understanding — provided that it is ex tended to telegraph and railway plant, and the other matters which the Russian practice is to treat as absolute contraband." The author says, "a long period of mari time peace produces a crop of curious doctrine unchecked by the logic of facts." As instances of this he refers to the doctrine that a war ship must be sent away from a neutral port within twenty-four hours on penalty of in ternment. "The sinking of neutral prizes, though perhaps allowed by Russian regula tions and countenanced by writers of author ity, seems to be an entire innovation and an inadmissible one." He similarly regards the confiscation of vessels laden wholly or mainlv with contraband goods. INTERNATIONAL LAW. "Exclusion and Deportation of Aliens," by " Parliamentum," Canadian Law Times (V. xxv, p. 487). INTERNATIONAL LAW (History). Ed ward Lindsey in the September American Law Revinv (V. xxxix, p. 658) discusses "The Evolution of International Law." He con tends that international law is now in the state in which private municipal law stood in mediaeval times and shows that its develop ment hitherto appears strikingly analogous to the development of primitive private law He, therefore, conjectures that the future of international law may conform to the later history of private law. HISTORY (Northern Securities Case). "The
