Century, made possible by steam navigation and the electric telegraph and cable; the great increase of travel and emigration from one country to another; the steady growth of education, the steady decline of what Robert Burns called "the inhumanity of man," and the steady improvement in the methods and aims of governments, — have all aided greatly in the growth of genuine peace sentiment, in the organization of peace societies, and in the holding of national and international peace congresses.

But the immediate cause of the holding of the first Hague Conference was the action of Nicholas II, Czar of Russia. It has seemed very remarkable to the rest of the world, and even to many Russians themselves, that such an impulse towards international peace should have come from the world's largest military power, the one, too, which can increase its military strength unrestricted by constitutional and parliamentary checks. But at many times in history "good things have come out of Nazareth";, and there is no sufficient reason to doubt that the present Czar is entirely sincere in his desire to promote the world's peace, and to diminish the burden of taxation for military and naval expenditures which presses down with enormously increasing weight upon the shoulders of the people

This desire of the Czar found practical expression when General Kuropatkin of the Russian army, M. Witte, Russia's finance minister, and Count Mouravieff, the Russian minister of foreign affairs, were endeavoring in the summer of 1898 to avoid the necessity of replacing an antiquated kind of artillery by a new and expensive one. The discussion of this question gave rise to the discussion of armaments in general, and by the Czar's orders Count Mouravieff prepared the famous “Rescript" of August 24

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(Russian style, August 12), 1898. This was a written statement as to the great increase in armaments in recent years, their evil results, and the desirability of checking their further growth; and it proposed that the governments should send representatives to a conference which should "occupy itself with this grave problem."

A copy of this statement and proposal was presented by Count Mouravieff to each of the ambassadors and ministers from other countries to Russia at their weekly reception at the Foreign Office in St. Petersburg, and was by them sent to their various governments. Some of these governments, among them that of the United States, promptly accepted the Czar's proposal, but others were indifferent to its object or skeptical as to its result, and it was not until October 24, 1898, that the last acceptance was received. Two months more elapsed, during which time "war and rumors of war" almost discouraged the Russian government in its task; but the sympathy of the public in every Western country had been aroused, and on January 11, 1899 (Russian style, December 30, 1898), Count Mouravieff issued a second rescript or circular, suggesting a programme of subjects to be discussed by the conference; and, finally, after more correspondence between the governments, an invitation was sent out on April 7 for the conference to assemble May 18 at The Hague.

b. THE CONFERENCE OF 1907

The The first conference in 1899 had met with such great success that it seemed most desirable that another conference should speedily be held to accomplish the work which the first one had left undone. But two terrible wars, the

Anglo-Boer and the Russo-Japanese, burst upon the world and shattered for a time all hope of another Peace Conference between the nations. The first conference, however, had shown what could be done, and peace men everywhere were determined that another should be called at the first opportunity. In September, 1904, when the RussoJapanese War was running its course, the Interparliamentary Union was holding its annual meeting in the city of St. Louis, Missouri. This Union is a very influential association, its members being the delegates elected by the people to represent them in the Congress of the United States, the Parliament of Great Britain and Ireland, in all the congresses of the American Republics and (with two exceptions) in all the parliaments of Europe. Its object is to promote the spirit of peace and friendliness among all the lawmakers of the world, and, by holding its meetings in each of the countries in turn, to arouse among the peoples themselves a genuine love of international peace. The meeting which it held in 1896 in Buda-Pesth, Hungary, so greatly impressed one of the Czar's ministers, M. Basiły,, that he at once began to advocate in Russia the reduction of armaments. In this and in various other ways, the Interparliamentary Union helped greatly, though indirectly, to bring about the meeting of the first conference at The Hague. The calling together of the second conference was due directly to its initiative.At its session in St. Louis, in 1904, Mr. Richard Bartholdy, Member of Congress from Missouri and founder of the American Group of the Interparliamentary Union, proposed a resolution requesting the governments of all the world to send delegates to a second international conference. The Union adopted this resolution unanimously, and sent a deputation

سلامية

of two hundred of its members to Washington to request President Roosevelt to convoke the conference.

The President received the deputation most cordially and promised to comply with their request. In October of 1904, Secretary of State John Hay, by the President's orders, published a circular discussing the work of the proposed conference and suggesting The Hague as its place of meeting. But the Russo-Japanese War was still raging, and the great powers did not think that the right time for holding the conference had arrived. When the war had been ended by the Treaty of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in September, 1905, a treaty concluded largely through President Roosevelt's aid, the Czar instructed his ambassador in Washington to communicate to the President the Czar's desire to convoke a second conference at The Hague, and to inquire if the President would be willing to relinquish the honor of calling the second one to the Czar, who had summoned the first. President Roosevelt expressed himself as delighted with this arrangement, and after the necessary diplomatic correspondence the Russian government issued its invitation to the nations and its programme of topics. This was in April, 1906; but as the American Republics had decided to hold the third of their Pan-American Conferences at Rio Janeiro in that year, the Hague Conference was postponed until 1907. In the spring of this year, the Russian government renewed its invitation, and it was finally decided that the conference should assemble on the fifteenth of June at The Hague.

II. PLACE OF MEETING

a. THE CONFERENCE OF 1899

In Count Mouravieff's second circular of January 11, 1899 (Russian style, December 30, 1898), it was stated that the Czar considered it "advisable that the conference should not sit in the capital of one of the Great Powers, where so many political interests are centered, as this might impede the progress of a work in which all the countries of the universe are equally interested." One month later the invited governments were informed that the Queen of the Netherlands had expressed her assent to the conference being held in her residence city, The Hague. And it was, accordforeign affairs who,

ingly, the Netherlands minister of accepting Russia's list of invited guests, extended on April 7, 1899, a formal invitation to the governments to send their delegates to meet at The Hague.

For several reasons, the choice of this city as the meeting place of the conference was a happy one. On the eastern coast of the Atlantic Ocean, it was readily acces sible to the twenty European countries represented in the conference; while it could be reached from the four Asiatic and two American countries without the necessity of long land journeys being taken after the ocean voyages were

1 The Hague, strictly speaking, is not the capital of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, although it is the seat of the national legislature, judiciary and executive; but as the Queen resides here during most of the year, it is called the residence city, "De Residentie."