sance du droit pour les États tiers d'user de ces moyens autrement qu'avec la réserve extrême qu'exige la nature délicate de ces démarches.

Nous n'admettrons les bons offices et la médiation qu'à condition de leur conserver pleinement et intégralement leur caractère de conseil purement amical, et nous ne saurions jamais les accepter dans des formes et des circonstances telles qu'elles pourraient leur imprimer le caractère d'une intervention.

Turquie:

La Délégation Ottomane, considérant que ce travail de la Conférence a été une œuvre de haute loyauté et d'humanité déstinée uniquement à raffermir la paix générale en sauvegardant les intérêts les droits de chacun, déclare au nom de son Gouvernement adhérer à l'ensemble du projet qui vient d'être adopté, aux conditions suivantes:

1. Il est formellement entendu que le recours aux bons offices, à la médiation, aux Commissions d'Enquête et à l'arbitrage est purement facultatif et ne saurait en aucun cas revêtir un caractère obligatoire ou dégénérer en intervention.

2. Le Gouvernement Impérial aura à juger lui-même des cas où ses intérêts lui permettraient d'admettre ces moyens, sans que son abstention ou son refus d'y avoir recours puissent être considérés par les États Signataires comme un procédé peu amical.

Il va de soi qu'en aucun cas les moyens dont il s'agit ne sauraient s'appliquer à des questions d'ordre intérieur.

of third States to use these means except with the extreme reserve which proceedings of this delicate nature require.

We do not admit good offices and mediation except on condition that their character of purely friendly counsel is maintained fully and completely, and we never could accept them in forms and circumstances such as to impress upon them the character of intervention.

Turkey:

The Turkish Delegation, considering that the work of this Conference has been a work of high loyalty and humanity, destined solely to assure general peace by safeguarding the interests and the rights of each one, declares, in the name of its Government, that it adheres to the project just adopted, on the following conditions:

1. It is formally understood that recourse to good offices and mediation, to commissions of inquiry and arbitration is purely facultative and could not in any case assume an obligatory character or degenerate into intervention.

2. The Imperial Government itself will be the judge of the cases where its interests would permit it to admit these methods without its abstention or refusal to have recourse to them being considered by the signatory states as an unfriendly act.

It goes without saying that in no case could the means in question be applied to questions concerning interior regulation.

OFFICIAL CORRESPONDENCE RELATING

TO THE SECOND CONFERENCE

THE SECRETARY OF STATE TO THE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE UNITED STATES ACCREDITED TO EACH OF THE GOVERNMENTS SIGNATORIES TO THE ACTS OF THE HAGUE CONFERENCE, 1899.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

WASHINGTON, October 21, 1904.

Sir: The Peace Conference which assembled at The Hague on May 18, 1899, marked an epoch in the history of nations. Called by His Majesty the Emperor of Russia to discuss the problems of the maintenance of general peace, the regulation of the operations of war, and the lessening of the burdens which preparedness for eventual war entails upon modern peoples, its labors resulted in the acceptance by the signatory powers of conventions for the peaceful adjustment of international difficulties by arbitration, and for certain humane amendments to the laws and customs of war by land and sea. A great work was thus accomplished by the conference, while other phases of the general subject were left to discussion by another conference in the near future, such as questions affecting the rights and duties of neutrals, the inviolability of private property, in naval warfare, and the bombardment of ports, towns, and villages by a naval force.

Among the movements which prepared the minds of governments for an accord in the direction of assured peace among men, a high place may fittingly be given to that set on foot by the Interparliamentary Union. From its origin in the suggestions of a member of the British House of Commons, in 1888, it developed until its membership included large numbers of delegates from the parliaments of the principal nations, pledged to exert their influence toward the conclusion of treaties of arbitration between nations and toward the accomplishment of peace. Its annual conferences have notably advanced the high

purposes it sought to realize. Not only have many international treaties of arbitration been concluded, but, in the conference held in Holland in 1894, the memorable declaration in favor of a permanent court of arbitration was a forerunner of the most important achievement of the Peace Conference of The Hague in 1899.

The annual conference of the Interparliamentary Union was held this year at St. Louis, in appropriate connection with the World's Fair. Its deliberations were marked by the same noble devotion to the cause of peace and to the welfare of humanity which had inspired its former meetings. By the unanimous vote of delegates, active or retired members of the American Congress and of every parliament in Europe with two exceptions, the following resolution was adopted:

WHEREAS, enlightened public opinion and modern civilization alike demand that differences between nations should be adjudicated and settled in the same manner as disputes between individuals are adjudicated, namely, by the arbitrament of courts in accordance with recognized principles of law, this conference requests the several governments of the world to send delegates to an international conference to be held at a time and place to be agreed upon by them for the purpose of considering:

1. The questions for the consideration of which the conference at The Hague expressed a wish that a future conference be called.

2. The negotiation of arbitration treaties between the nations represented at the conference to be convened.

3. The advisability of establishing an international congress to convene periodically for the discussion of international questions.

And this conference respectfully and cordially requests the President of the United States to invite all the nations to send representatives to such a conference.

On the 24th of September, ultimo, these resolutions were presented to the President by a numerous deputation of the Interparliamentary Union. The President accepted the charge offered to him, feeling it to be most appropriate that the Executive of the nation which had welcomed the conference to its hospitality should give voice to its impressive utterances in a cause which the American Government and people hold dear. He announced that he would at an early date invite the other nations, parties to the Hague conventions, to reassemble with a view to pushing forward toward completion the work already begun at The Hague, by considering the questions which the

first conference had left unsettled with the express provision that there should be a second conference.

In accepting this trust, the President was not unmindful of the fact, so vividly brought home to all the world, that a great war is now in progress. He recalled the circumstance that at the time when, on August 24, 1898, His Majesty the Emperor of Russia sent forth his invitation to the nations to meet in the interests of peace, the United States and Spain had merely halted, in their struggle, to devise terms of peace. While at the present moment no armistice between the armies now contending is in sight, the fact of an existing war is no reason why the nations should relax the efforts they have so successfully made hitherto towards the adoption of rules of conduct which may make more remote the chances of future wars between them. In 1899 the Conference of The Hague dealt solely with the larger general problems which confront all nations, and assumed no function of intervention or suggestion in the settlement of the terms of peace between the United States and Spain. It might be the same with a reassembled conference at the present time. Its efforts would naturally lie in the direction of further codification of the universal ideas of right and justice which we call international law; its mission would be to give them future effect.

The President directs that you will bring the foregoing considerations to the attention of the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Government to which you are accredited and, in discreet conference with him, ascertain to what extent that Government is disposed to act in the matter.

Should His Excellency invite suggestion as to the character of the questions to be brought before the proposed Second Peace Conference, you may say to him that, at this time, it would seem premature to couple the tentative invitation thus extended with a categorical programme of subjects of discussion. It is only by comparison of views that a general accord can be reached as to the matters to be considered by the new conference. It is desirable that in the formulation of a programme the distinction should be kept clear between the matters which belong to the province of international law and those which are conventional as between individual governments. The Final Act of the Hague Conference, dated July 29, 1899, kept this distinction