customs of warfare came to be contemplated, it was clear that International Law on such a subject could not be modified so as to make the new rules binding upon all, unless every important power gave its express consent. The accession of the Cabinet of Washington to the Geneva Convention was therefore requested; and not till it was given in 1882 could the complete neutralization of the persons and things devoted to the service of the sick and wounded be deemed to have been embodied as an accepted principle in the international code. On the other hand the neutralization of the Suez Canal may be considered as having been accomplished by the Convention of 1888, which has been neither accepted nor protested against by the United States. The reason for the difference in the two cases is that American armies may be a most important factor in land warfare, as the civil war between the Northern and Southern states conclusively proved, whereas American ships make hardly any use of the Suez Canal. In 1897, the last year for which the figures are available, only three vessels passed through the canal under the flag of the United States, as against 1905 belonging to Great Britain.1

It is necessary to add that the word neutralization and kindred terms have sometimes been used in a loose and inaccurate sense in treaties and other international documents. Rivers that have been opened to the peaceful commerce of the world, straits and seas on the shores of which each of the two contracting parties has bound itself not to erect fortifications, have been spoken of as neutralized; while an arrangement whereby a powerful state has undertaken to assist a weak neighbor in defending from attack an important waterway has been declared to amount to a valid and complete neutralization.2 Precision of statement and cogency of reasoning are impossible unless the words used have a clear 1 Statesman's Year Book for 1897, p. 1057.

2 For instances see Lawrence, Essays on International Law (2d ed.), pp. 142-156.

and recognized meaning attached to them. Theological controversies are not the only ones that have arisen for lack of a definition of technical terms. If the phrases connected with neutralization were never used save in the sense that our analysis shows to belong to them, more than one international dispute would disappear for lack of material to sustain it. It is fortunate that when in 1817 the United States and Great Britain restricted by mutual agreement the naval force each was to maintain on the Great Lakes, and cut it down to a few gunboats useful only for the purposes of police,1 they did not attempt to dignify a small and sensible restraint upon their sovereign rights with the high-sounding name of neutralization; and it would have been well if the same reticence had been observed in other cases.

Neutralized portions of unneutralized states.

§ 247.

We have now dealt with neutralized states, neutralized waterways and neutralized persons and things, but we have given no consideration to neutralized provinces. They are portions of states; and the bodies politic to which they belong are free to make war at pleasure. The position of a neutralized part of an unneutralized state is so anomalous that we have been obliged to reserve it for separate treatment in this section. The most conspicuous instance is that of Savoy, which was neutralized in 1815 by the treaties of Vienna and Paris, and made to “form a part of the neutrality of Switzerland." Savoy then belonged to Sardinia, and it was stipulated that if the neighboring powers were at war the province should be evacuated by Sardinian soldiers and garrisoned for the time being by the neutral troops of Switzerland. When in 1860 Savoy was ceded to France, both Switzerland and the Great Powers declared that the original engagement of neutrality was given in the interests of all the parties to the treaties of

1 Treaties of the United States, pp. 413-415.

1815, and argued that, if the province were united to a great military state like France, there could be little or no security for the continuance of the special condition imposed upon it. France and Sardinia on the other hand contended that the neutrality guaranteed to Savoy was in favor of Sardinia only; but they were willing to agree that France, as successor to Sardinia, should fulfil the obligations arising out of it.1 No solution of the difficulty by general consent was reached at the time; but when in 1883 the Federal Council of Switzerland complained of the commencement of fortifications by France on the neutralized territory and not far from the city of Geneva, the government of the French Republic recognized the justice of the Swiss remonstrance and ordered the works to be discontinued.2 It is clear, therefore, that some limitation upon the ordinary rights of sovereignty is accepted by France as a condition of its tenure of Savoy. Yet it is impossible to say how far this limitation extends, and what amount of recognition of Savoyard neutrality could be asked of a power which was engaged in warfare with France. The government of the Republic would be free to obtain conscripts from the population of the province supposed to be neutralized, and to levy therein extraordinary taxes for the purpose of supporting the war. It would not be obliged to evacuate the territory and allow Swiss troops to hold it during hostilities; for nothing of the kind was done in the course of the great struggle with Germany in 1870, and the precedents of that period would probably be followed in any future war. But if France is free to use all the resources of Savoy for warlike purposes, it is hardly likely that the enemies of France will abstain from attacking Savoyard territory should they deem themselves likely to gain any military advantage from invasion. No German troops attempted to penetrate into it during the war of 1870

1 Amos, Political and Legal Remedies for War, pp. 217, 218; Wheaton, International Law (Dana's ed.), note 202.

2 Annual Register for 1883, pp. 269, 270.

"1

1871; but the strategy of their leaders did not include military operations so far to the south. Had the plan of their campaign required it, they would undoubtedly have entered the province without hesitation; and it is difficult to believe that Italian strategists have allowed their calculations of the chances of invasion to be altered in any way by the shadowy neutrality of a portion of the frontier between Italy and her northwestern neighbor. Considerations of a similar kind apply to Corfu and Paxo, two of the Ionian Islands, which were formally neutralized by the Great Powers when the group to which they belong was handed over to Greece in 1864. The King of Greece engaged "to maintain such neutrality. His obligations are nowhere expressed in more definite phraseology, and it is obvious that they are as vague as words can make them. The Greek Government draws men and supplies from these islands, as from other portions of its dominions; and, that being the case, justice appears to demand that a power at war with Greece should be free to attack and occupy them. When a whole state has been neutralized its rights and obligations are clear; but legal ingenuity fails before the attempt to define the immunities and duties of a neutralized part of a non-neutralized whole. Its position is anomalous to the last degree. We may rest assured that such an artificial arrangement will not stand the strain of a serious war.

Some perception of the difficulties we have indicated seems to have influenced the powers assembled in the West African Congress of Berlin, when they discussed the question of the neutrality of the territories comprised in the conventional basin of the Congo, some of which belong to various European states. Mr. Kasson, the American plenipotentiary, proposed that the districts in question should be permanently neutralized under the guarantee of the signatory powers. But though the project brought forward by him received weighty support, the Congress finally decided 1 Holland, European Concert in the Eastern Question, pp. 45–54.

against it, on the ground that a belligerent state could not be required to deprive itself of a part of its means of action, or to refrain from using a portion of its dominions. The representative of the United States pointed out that the development of America in the colonial epoch had been greatly retarded by wars between the European powers who held territorial possessions within it, and declared that his proposition was formulated with a view to saving Africa from similar calamities. The object of the American Government met with general concurrence, and an attempt was made to realize it in the Final Act of the Conference, which was signed on Feb. 26, 1885. The eleventh article provided that "in case a power exercising rights of sovereignty or protectorate in the counties mentioned in article 1, and placed under the free-trade system, shall be involved in a war, then the High Signatory Parties to the present Act, and those who shall hereafter adopt it, bind themselves to lend their good offices in order that the territories belonging to this power and comprised in the conventional free-trade zone, shall, by the common consent of this power and the other belligerent or belligerents, be placed during the war under the rule of neutrality, and considered as belonging to a non-belligerent state, the belligerents henceforth abstaining from extending hostilities to the territories thus neutralized, and from using them as a base for warlike operations." Temporary exemption from hostilities by the consent of all the parties to the war is very different from permanent neutralization. But it may be possible when the latter is impossible. Should the case contemplated above ever arise, it will be interesting to watch whether the belligerent powers agree to make the arrangement indicated, or are content to regard it as a counsel of perfection inapplicable to mundane affairs.1

1 See Protocols and General Act of the West African Conference, in British State Papers, Africa, No. 4 (1885), pp. 146-149, 183-185, 256– 258, 307.