Woodrow Wilson as I Know HimTumulty, Joseph P. (Joseph Patrick)
History
Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him
Tumulty, Joseph P. (Joseph Patrick)
Presidents -- United States -- Biography; Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924
The particular and most important thing to which every nation that
joins the League agrees is this: That it won't fight on any question
at all until it has done one of two things. If it is about a question
that it considers suitable for arbitration it will submit it to
arbitration. You know, Mr. Taft and other serious advocates of this
general idea have tried to distinguish between justiciable and non-
justiciable subjects, and while they have had more or less success
with it, the success has not been satisfactory. You cannot define
expressly the questions which nations would be willing to submit to
arbitration. Some question of national pride may come in to upset the
definition. So we said we would make them promise to submit every
question that they considered suitable to arbitration and to abide by
the result. If they do not regard it as suitable for arbitration they
bind themselves to submit it to the consideration of the Executive
Council for a period not exceeding six months, but they are not bound
by the decision. It is an opinion, not a decision. But if a decision,
a unanimous decision, is made, and one of the parties to the dispute
accepts the decision, the other party does bind itself not to attack
the party that accepts the opinion. Now in discussing that we saw this
difficulty. Suppose that Power B is in possession of a piece of
territory which Power A claims, and Power A wins its claim so far as
the opinion of the Executive Council is concerned. And suppose that
the power in possession of the territory accepts the decision but then
simply stands pat and does nothing. It has got the territory. The
other party, inasmuch as the party that has lost has accepted the
decision, has bound itself not to attack it and cannot go by force of
arms and take possession of the country. In order to cure that
quandary we used a sentence which said that in case—I have forgotten
the phraseology but it means this—in case any power refuses to carry
out the decision the Executive Council was to consider the means by
which it could be enforced. Now that apparently applies to both
parties but was intended to apply to the non-active party which
refuses to carry it out. And that sentence is open to a
misconstruction. The Commission did not see that until after the
report was made and I explained this to the General Conference. I made
an explanation which was substantially the same as I have made to you,
and that this should be of record may be sufficient to interpret that
phrase, but probably not. It is not part of the Covenant and possibly
an attempt ought to be made to alter it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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