TENTATIVE DRAFT OF A TREATY FOR A LEAGUE OF NATIONS Approved by the Executive Committee of the League to Enforce Peace, New York, April 11, 1918 HISTORICAL NOTE The League to Enforce Peace, which was organized at Philadelphia on June 17, 1915, established an organization supporting a program of four points: judicial settlement, conciliation, sanctions and conferences. Throughout the period until the Armistice of November 11, 1918, it avoided formulating the details of organization necessary to bring those principles into effect in order to avoid differences of opinion over the practical aspects of the plan. At the armistice, the League to Enforce Peace had branches in practically every county of every state in the United States, and it had long regarded the Fourteenth Point enunciated by the President on January 8, 1918, as an official adoption of its program. That point read as follows: A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guaranties of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike. While the League to Enforce Peace had avoided discussing details in its public campaign, it had from its beginning a committee, more or less autonomous, which was engaged in elaborating a draft convention to give its program a practical constitution. Early in 1918 this committee submitted its results to the Executive Committee of the League to Enforce Peace, which thereupon appointed a committee consisting of William H. Taft, A. Lawrence Lowell, Oscar S. Straus, Theodore Marburg, Hamilton Holt, Talcott Williams, William H. Short and Glenn Frank to prepare a draft convention on behalf of the Executive Committee. This committee reported on March 23, 1918, and the report was approved by the Executive Committee on April 11, with slight verbal changes. For many months the League to Enforce Peace had been planning a meeting on "Win the War for Permanent Peace" at Philadelphia on May 16-18. The tentative program of that meeting records an afternoon session planned for May 17 on the subject of "The Machinery of a League of Nations, showing the results of sustained research on just how the nations might cooperate to guarantee the peace of the world." An Associated Press dispatch from Washington on March 28, stated that "Former President Taft and President A. Lawrence Lowell of Harvard University to-day laid before President Wilson the program of the win-the-war convention". In its Bulletin of April 20, the League to Enforce Peace announced that the proposed convention in Philadelphia would occupy two days instead of three and published a second tentative program in which the session referred to above was not mentioned. At Philadelphia on May 16, the text herewith printed was stated by the Secretary to be available to members at his office, where the copies distributed were marked "Confidential. Not to be given to the press." As a consequence the tentative draft herewith printed was not permitted to reach the public during the days when the Covenant of the League of Nations was being made or later when the question of ratification was being discussed in the Senate. Since, however, the League to Enforce Peace made the proposal its own through its Executive Committee, this tentative draft undoubtedly represented the convictions of the great membership of the League to Enforce Peace throughout the country. The draft is now published because of its obvious interest as a precursor of the Protocol for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes.Editor. 1. The parties to this treaty hereby form a League of Nations for the promotion and preservation of future peace. The members of the League shall be the states that join the same at its formation, and any other independent states that may be at any time admitted by a majority (or two-thirds) vote of the Conference hereinafter described. Adhesion to the League, on the part both of the original and subsequent states, shall, in the case of each state, be ratified by the treaty-making authority and approved by the legislative authority thereof; but such ratification and approval shall not deprive any organ of government in any state of its constitutional rights. 2. There shall be three groups of members of the League: Those states which assume the full responsibilities of the League, with the duty, when its provisions are to be enforced, of using their whole economic and military power as provided in Section 17. States which in case of economic enforcement shall take the same commercial measures as the states of the first group; and in case of 1The League Bulletin, No. 78, March 15, 1918. enforcement by arms shall declare war against the common foe and shall be under no obligation to furnish military forces except as they may find practicable. By reason of their lesser responsibilities they shall have a smaller representation in the organs of the League. Neutralized states that are to take no part in the enforcement. These shall be perpetually neutral, and shall engage in no war, unless invaded, when they shall be defended by the whole force of the League. They agree to accept and carry out all decisions of both the Court and Council of Conciliation hereinafter described, and their neutrality is hereby guaranteed by the League and by every member thereof. The group to which each member belongs shall be determined at the time it enters the League, and shall not be changed except by its own consent and by a majority vote of the Conference and of the executive body of the League. 3. All justiciable questions arising between the members of the League, not settled by negotiation, shall be submitted to a judicial tribunal, hereinafter called the Court of the League, for hearing and judgment; unless the parties to the controversy agree to submit the question to the Permanent Court at The Hague or some other special tribunal. The members of the League hereby agree to comply with the Decisions of the Court of the League. 4. All other questions arising between the members of the League and not settled by negotiation or arbitration shall be submitted to a Council of Conciliation for hearing, consideration and recommendation. 5. In case of a difference of opinion between the parties to the controversy, or of doubt on the part of the Court or Council, whether the question is justiciable or not, that issue shall be submitted to a Court of Conflicts, constituted as hereinafter provided, whose decision thereof shall be final. 6. The members of the League shall jointly use diplomatic and economic pressure against any state, whether a member of the League or not, that threatens war against a member of the League without having first submitted its dispute for international inquiry, conciliation, arbitration or judicial hearing, and awaited a conclusion, or without having in good faith offered so to submit it. They shall follow this forthwith by the joint and several use of their military forces against that state if it actually goes to war with, or commits acts of hostility against, any member of the League before the matter in controversy shall have been submitted to the Court or Council as provided in the foregoing paragraphs, or within twelve calendar months after such submission; or, if the decision or recommendation has been made within that time, within six months after it has been made. 7. There shall be established a Court of Claims, to which any persons or corporate bodies may, with consent of their own government and any other governments involved, present their claims for adjudication and report. 8. From time to time as hereinafter provided there shall be held a Congress of the League, one of the objects being to formulate and codify rules of international law, which, unless one-third of the members of the League shall signify their dissent within twelve months, shall be established as international law and thereafter govern in the decisions of the Court of the League. 9. The Organs of the League shall be as follows: The Court of the League, the Council of Conciliation, the Court of Conflicts, the Court of Claims, the Congress and the executive body of the League. The Court of the League shall be a permanent tribunal continuously open. It shall consist of not more than sixteen judges, whereof the members of the League of the first group shall each appoint one judge for six years, and the members of the second and third groups shall each appoint a judge to sit for one, two or three years, so arranged that the total number of judges from these groups shall not exceed eight in all. A judge appointed by a member of the League that is a party to a controversy before the Court shall not sit in the case; nor shall any judge sit who has a direct or indirect personal or pecuniary interest in a question to be decided, or has acted as counsel or judge therein. In case of a vacancy, or of a personal disqualification of a judge, the member of the League by which he was appointed may appoint a substitute for the duration of the vacancy or disqualification. Except as provided herein, or in the convention establishing the court, or by subsequent regulation by the Congress of the League, the Court shall make its own rules of procedure. Decisions shall be made by an absolute majority of judges sitting in the case, and if the Court is equally divided the presiding judge shall have a casting vote in addition to his vote as a judge. The presence of a majority of the judges shall be necessary and sufficient for a quorum. The Court shall elect one of its members President, and shall determine which of its members shall preside in his absence. Each judge shall receive from the League a salary of a year and shall receive, while a judge of the Court, no other compensation, title, honor or decoration from any government. A judge may be removed for misconduct, disability or incompetence by a two-thirds vote of the members of the Congress present and voting. 10. The Council of Conciliation shall also be a permanent body. It |