THE LEAGUE OF NATiONS : AN HISTORICAL ARGUMENT..
PROFESSOR POLL ono essay is one of the sanest that we have yet seen. He holds that the amid is now one community in a fuller arose than ever before. But he is not impressed by any
of the thirty-seven more or less elaborate schemes for a League of Nations, which remind him of the Constitutions evolved from his inner consciousness by the Abbe Sieyes. Mankind, he thinks, is net ready for a super-State or a League with an inter- national force. What we all want is peace ; we desire not so much to avoid disputes, which are inevitable, ea to rule out war as a means of nettling disputes. Professor Pollanl refers to the Wars of Religion ; they ended when men saw that religious disputes could not be settled by war, but the disputes still go on :—
" The first step towards permanent pence is not, therefore, the erection of a tribunal or the establiahinent of a super-State.
It is is simple treaty between an many Powers am possible not to
make war upon one another without previous recourse to other means, and to resist with all their forces any- similar breach of
the peace on the part of others. It might be sufficient to limit the obligation to an undertaking to resist aggression pending tun attempt to settle the dispute by other means; that is to any, to set up a momforitma, for attacks that do not come off at the moment are usually postponed aint die."
We have repeatedly advocated a simple agreement of this kind. President Wilson in his Sorbonne speech :teemed to accept the principle of the enforced nmenimium of a year. Professor Mime', in urging that the first short step, once taken, would lead us far, recalls the analogy of Henry 11.'s writ de pace habenda, which eflonled holders of land a means of settling disputes without recourse to private war. Out of these writs grew trial by juin which was extended by other writs to eases not concerned with land. " We became a litigious people, but it was an
improvement on a duelling caste ; and the habit of arguing law Wale extended to polities." The law grew, and the Courts
developed slowly through the eenturiee ; Henry H. did not start with a regular Code and an elaborate judicial system. " So, too, we need not be anxious to compel arbitration ; we
only need our writ de part habenda among nations sanctioned by a League to prevent aggression," leaving disputants to adjust their differences in any other way but that of war. Professor Pollard would maintain the existing League of the Allies, adding the neutrals, Poland, Bohemia, end other new and friendly States. He thinks that Germany would not care much whether she were admitted or excluded, inasmuch as the League would secure her from attack.
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