PREFACE
THE majority of the following chapters were prepared for the Army and Navy Journal in the belief that the European war of 1914 was to force upon the attention of the United States issues that might readily lead to war, if the country was true to its traditions as a Neutral Power.
Of these issues the fundamental one, which in a sense involves all others, is of course—whether or not a peaceful commercial people shall have a place under the sun, or, to put it differently, whether nations that prefer the cultivation of commerce, art, and letters are to impose their will upon militant peoples or be ruled by these.
While the fact that the United States may be made a belligerent by breach of its neutrality, makes it suitable for officers, upon whom the nation depends in time of stress, to discuss the rights and duties of neutrals, it is the subject of no less concern to the citizen who craves peace.
This is because, with the elimination of time and space, the nations have been drawn together in such a pell-mell way as to make strife between any two of them of grave import to the others; and because the subject of a great Power, which may become instantly involved in hostilities by a ministerial message that reflects nothing but self-respect, is apt to find himself involved in the swift (not slow) workings of God-driven mills.
A century ago, when the United States was painfully evolving the neutrality laws which found expression in the Statutes of 1818, little consideration was given to the rights and duties of neutrals because the arbitrary will of monarchs made war a political necessity. There were neutrals in name, and armed neutralities, but they were both too weak-kneed to be efficient.
The imagination of a magician could hardly conceive of the change that a hundred years have made. To-day peoples, although some of them are not as yet sufficiently self-conscious, not kings, are the important factors, and the attention of the peoples is turned toward commerce not arms. It follows inexorably, if these conditions continue, that the sort of neutrality which seeks to separate itself from international quarrels, and which is the antithesis of belligerency, is on the eve of coming into its own.
Will it? Yes! If neutrals, in an epoch that is elemental because of the rush of unharnessed forces, and at a time when the flight of an army corps in distant battlefields may be the signal for changes terrific in their consequence, prepare themselves, by arming and unflinchingly standing by their rights, to compel peace as soldier kings have compelled war.
While the author believes and has not hesitated to point out that many customs incorporated in the law of nations are based on faulty logic, and should be eliminated or modified, he is impressed by the fact that law to be of value must be authoritative. Great care has therefore been taken, in such reference to the rights and duties of neutrals as the scope of this book has permitted, to state what appears to be the positive law of nations, and to make it clear tha the latter must control until revision is made.
D.C.B.
Boston, Dec., 1915.