1. THE PERMANENT COURT OF ARBITRATION b. THE CONFERENCE OF 1907. 3. THE COURT OF ARBITRAL JUSTICE A SUMMARY OF RESULTS AND THEIR HISTORI- CAL IMPORTANCE 454 IV. ARBITRATION ✔ I. OBLIGATORY ARBITRATION 2. THE FORCIBLE COLLECTION OF DEBTS THE TWO HAGUE CONFERENCES I. ORIGIN a. THE CONFERENCE OF 1899 THE beginning of the Nineteenth Century found Europe struggling in the throes of the great Napoleonic Wars; its end saw the meeting of the first Peace Conference at The Hague. Our own country was drawn into the Napoleonic struggle and fought the War of 1812. At the end of that war, when the civilized world lay breathless and ashamed of its quarter century of fighting, the first peace society was organized in New York City. Other peace societies were slowly formed, and the next generation held a series of international peace congresses in the capitals of Europe.1 But then ensued another generation of warfare, and it was not till 1889 that the international peace congresses again assembled. Sixteen of these congresses have since that time been held in the large cities of both the Old World and the New, and have done a very great deal to prepare the way for the conferences at the Hague. The marvelous growth of commerce in the Nineteenth 1In London, 1843; Brussels, 1848; Paris, 1849; Frankfort, 1850; London, 1851. 2 Paris, London, Rome, Berne, Chicago (in 1893), Antwerp, Buda-Pesth, Hamburg, Paris, Glasgow, Monaco, Rouen, Boston (in 1904), Lucerne, Milan, and Munich. |