TEXTS OF THE PEACE CONFERENCES AT THE HAGUE, 1899 AND 1907 WITH ENGLISH TRANSLATION AND APPENDIX OF RELATED DOCUMENTS EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION, BY JAMES BROWN SCOTT TECHNICAL DELEGATE OF THE UNITED STATES TO THE SECOND PEACE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY PREFATORY NOTE BY ELIHU ROOT SECRETARY OF STATE PUBLISHED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL OF PEACE PREFATORY NOTE IN the letter submitting The Hague Conventions of 1907 for consideration by the Senate, the Secretary of State said: "Let me go beyond the limits of the customary formal letter of transmittal and say that I think the work of the Second Hague Conference, which is mainly embodied in these Conventions, presents the greatest advance ever made at any single time toward the reasonable and peaceful regulation of international conduct, unless it be the advance made at The Hague Conference of 1899. "The most valuable result of the Conference of 1899 was that it made the work of the Conference of 1907 possible. The achievements of the Conferences justify the belief that the world has entered upon - an orderly process through which, step by step, in successive Conferences, each taking the work of its predecessor as its point of departure, there may be continual progress toward making the practice of civilized nations conform to their peaceful professions." The collection of documents in this volume brings into relief a fa which should affect our judgment regarding all of the attempts i recent years to secure international agreement upon matters affectir, peace and war; this fact is that each attempt is to be considered, no by itself alone, but as part of a series in which sound proposals ma come to general acceptance only by a very gradual process extendi through many years. For example, Dr. Francis Lieber's Instructio for the Government of the Army of the United States in the Fie prepared for President Lincoln and embodied by him in Gene Order No. 100 of the year 1863, has now developed, after forty-f years, into the universal "Convention regarding the laws and custo of land warfare," signed at the last Hague Conference. The th rules of the Treaty of Washington, agreed upon by the United St and Great Britain, in 1871, are now accepted by the civilized wo in 1907, in The Hague "Convention respecting the rights and duties of neutral powers in naval war." |