ART. 3. They declare, nevertheless, that they accept no responsibility as regards the international telegraph service. ART. 5. Telegrams are classed in three categories: 1. State telegrams: those emanating from the head of the nation, the ministers, the commanders in chief of the army and naval forces, and the diplomatic or consular agents of the contracting governments, as well as the answers to such telegrams. 2. Service telegrams: those which emanate from the managements of the telegraph service of the contracting states and which relate either to the international telegraph service or to subjects of public interest determined jointly by such managements. 3. Private telegrams. In the transmission, the state telegrams shall have precedence over other telegrams. ART. 6. State telegrams and service telegrams may be issued in secret language, in any communications. Private telegrams may be exchanged in secret language between two states which admit of this mode of correspondence. The states which do not admit of private telegrams in secret language, upon the expedition or arrival of the same, shall allow them to pass in transit, except in the case of suspension defined in Article 8. ART. 7. The high contracting parties reserve the right to stop the transmission of any private telegram which may appear dangerous to the safety of the state, or which may be contrary to the laws of the country, to public order or good morals. ART. 8. Each government also reserves the right to suspend the international telegraph service for an indefinite period, if deemed necessary by it, either generally, or only over certain lines and for certain classes of correspondence, of which such government shall immediately notify all the other contracting governments. ART. 11. Telegrams relating to the international telegraph service of the contracting states shall be transmitted free of charge over the entire systems of such states. ART. 12. The high contracting parties shall render accounts to one another of the charges collected by each of them. ART. 17. The high contracting parties reserve respectively the right to enter among themselves into special arrangements of any kind with regard to points of the service which do not interest the states generally. CHAPTER XIX EXCHANGE OF DOCUMENTS Of a minor character, and including only a small number of nations, is an agreement which may suitably be extended to include all the nations, and which is for the promotion of information in each regarding the official action of the others, including their scientific and literary publications. These conventions are therefore included in this compilation. On March 15, 1886, there was concluded at Brussels, between the United States, Belgium, Brazil, Italy, Portugal, Servia, and Spain a convention for "the immediate exchange of the official journal, as well as of the parliamentary annals and documents, of their respective states." This convention was as follows: ART. 1. Independently of the obligations which result from Article 2 of the general convention of this day, relative to the exchange of official documents and of scientific and literary publications, the respective governments undertake to have transmitted to the legislative chambers of each contracting state, as fast as their publication, a copy of the official journal, as well as of the parliamentary annals and documents which are given publicity. ART. 2. The states which have not taken part in the present convention are admitted to adhere thereto on their request. This adhesion will be notified diplomatically to the Belgian government, and by that government to all the other signatory states. ART. 3. The present convention will be ratified and the ratifications will be exchanged at Brussels as soon as practicable. It is concluded for ten years from the day of the exchange of the ratifications and it will remain in force beyond that time, so long as one of the governments shall not have declared six months in advance that it renounces it. In witness whereof, the respective plenipotentiaries have signed it, and have thereunto affixed their seals. Done at Brussels, in seven copies, the 15th of March, 1886. [Signatures follow] On March 15, 1886, there was concluded a convention between the United States, Belgium, Brazil, Italy, Portugal, Servia, Spain, and Switzerland for "a system of international exchanges of the official documents and of the scientific and literary publications of their respective states," as follows: ART. I. There shall be established in each of the contracting states a bureau charged with the duty of the exchanges. ART. 2. The publications which the contracting states agree to exchange are the following: Ist. The official documents, parliamentary and administrative, which are published in the country of their origin. 2nd. The works executed by order and at the expense of the government. ART. 3. Each bureau shall cause to be printed a list of the publications that it is able to place at the disposal of the contracting states. This list shall be corrected and completed each year and regularly addressed to all the bureaus of exchange. ART. 4. The bureaus of exchange will arrange between themselves the number of copies which they may be able eventually to demand and furnish. ART. 5. The transmissions shall be made directly from bureau to bureau. Uniform models and formulas will be adopted for the memoranda of the contents of the cases, as well as for all the administrative correspondence, requests, acknowledgments of reception, etc. ART. 6. For exterior transmissions, each state assumes the expense of packing and transportation to the place of destination. Nevertheless, when the transmissions shall be made by sea, special arrangements will regulate the share of each state in the expense of transportation. Art. 7. The bureaus of exchange will serve, in an official capacity, as intermediaries between the learned bodies and literary and scientific societies, etc., of the contracting states for the reception and transmission of their publications. It remains, however, well understood that, in such case, the duty of the bureaus of exchange will be confined to the free transmission of the works exchanged, and that these bureaus will not in any manner take the initiative to bring about the establishment of such relations. ART. 8. These provisions apply only to the documents and works published after the date of the present convention. ART. 9. The states which have not taken part in the present convention are admitted to adhere to it on their request. This adhesion will be notified diplomatically to the Belgian government and by that government to all the other signatory states. ART. 10. The present convention will be ratified, and the ratifications will be exchanged at Brussels, as soon as practicable. It is concluded for ten years, from the day of the exchange of ratifications, and it will remain in force beyond that time, so long as one of the governments shall not have declared six months in advance that it renounces it. In witness whereof, the respective plenipotentiaries have signed it, and have thereunto affixed their seals. Done at Brussels, in eight copies, the 15th of March, 1886. [Signatures follow] CHAPTER XX THE WORLD JUDICIARY After the Hague court of arbitration had been established by act of the Hague peace conference of 1899, it seemed as if that court might possibly be the germ from which would be developed the world judiciary. Here was a body whose official name was "Court." By it was to be dispensed justice to both sides of a controversy. It is true that in reality the court of arbitration is a department of the world executive, as a state board of arbitration is a part of the state executive department, not of the judicial. But the use of the word "Court," and the circumstances amid which the court is to act, made it. plausible that here was a germ of the world judiciary. But much sooner than any such germ could grow appreciably by the addition of true judicial functions came the action of the delegates of all the nations assembled in the second peace conference at The Hague, in 1907. In the proposition before that conference for the establishment of an international prize court was the germ of a true world judiciary. The proposition was fruitful, and in the list of conventions adopted by the second conference and submitted to the nations for ratification is that "relative to the establishment of an international prize court." This international court is to be a court of appeals from the decisions of national prize courts. But it appears clearly that, for the first time, there is a formal establishment of a true world judiciary; for the language used in the preamble to the articles includes these words: "the institution of an international court, whose jurisdiction and procedure would be carefully defined." In the articles of this convention there is true world law whereby this "international court," with "jurisdiction and procedure . . . carefully defined," is established. The subjects of its jurisdiction are specified by this law of all the nations. The nations, furthermore, when they ratify this convention, fix the methods whereby this world court of appeals shall act. The lack of a world executive power with strength to compel is recognized; and what is really a higher power than a world police or a world army, for honorable nations, is brought in, namely, the solemn pledge of each nation. Read Article 9 again : "The contracting Powers undertake to submit in good faith to the decisions of the international prize court, and to carry them out with the least possible delay." There is the sufficient substitute for a world army to enforce the decisions of world courts. Those few words have a mighty historical pertinence in questions which will surely arise in the development of the single organic government of the world. Still further, this convention, or chapter of world law, prescribes how the international prize court shall be constituted. Full provision is made for the procedure of the court. Details are duly provided for, even to the formality whereby the life of this judicial germ may itself be destroyed, a catastrophe to the world which should never occur, unless some better form of judicial proceedings is substituted whereby the development of the world judiciary may be carried forward upon better conditions. This convention for the establishment of an international prize court might fitly be included in this chapter regarding the judicial department of the world; but it is retained in its place with other conventions of the Second Hague Conference in order that the results of that body may appear as a historic whole. Some of the nations which took part in the conference of 1907 were not satisfied with the method of practice proposed for the international prize court. In order that some code might be agreed upon before any case should be presented, the international naval conference was held in London, beginning December 4, 1908, upon the invitation of Great Britain, to draft a convention and formulate rules in accordance with Article 7, paragraph 2, of the convention relating to the creation of an international prize court, which was signed at The Hague in 1907. This Article 7, paragraph 2, is as follows: "In the absence of such provisions, the court shall apply the rules of international law. If no generally recognized rule exists, the court shall give judgment in accordance with the general principles of justice and equity." Because of the vagueness of such a basis of procedure, fearing detriment to immense commercial interests, Great Britain called the conference. To that conference were invited the United States, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Germany, Italy, Austria-Hungary, Russia, and |