Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 95, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1899 — PEACE MEET IS OVER [ARTICLE]

PEACE MEET IS OVER

• WHAT WAS DONE AT THE HAGUE CONFERENCE. The Foundation of an Arbitration Plan the Only Important Achieve-ment-No Specific Proposition Looking to Disarmament Adopted. The Czar’s international peace conference at The Hague has concluded its work. A fair estimate of what has been accomplished cannot be made until the propositions agreed to have been published in full. But no proposition looking to the disarmament of nations was adopted. The signatory powers agreed to use all their efforts to insure a peaceful solution in international differences, but it was provided that the good offices or mediation of a third, power shall exclusively have the bearing of good counsel without compulsory force. Offers of mediation in any given case shall not cause the suspension of war preparations or the interruption of war. Special forms of mediation are recommended, but only recommended. Differences which may be made the object of local injury, and which do not involve the honor or vital interests of the powers concerned, are to be submitted to international committees of inquiry, but the reports of these committees are not to have the character of an arbitration award, but are to leave the powers concerned at liberty to act as they feel best. Arbitration is acknowledged to be the most efficient and most equitable mode of settling differences, and the signatory powers agree to organize a permanent court of arbitration accessible at all times. It is optional with any power whether it shall take any particular case before the arbitration court or not. Article 27 declares: “The signatory powers consider it their duty, whenever an acute conflict threatening to peace occurs between any of them, to recall to the latter that the arbitration court is open to them.” The American delegates took exception to this article, and insisted that the language be so modified that the United States may in no case be obliged to interfere in European affairs, or Europe in American disputes. Declarations were adopted prohibiting the use of asphyxiating projectiles or expanding bullets, which Great Britain and the United States declined to accept. Nothing has been accomplished as to disarmament, and little more than a declaration favorable to the principle of arbitration has been accepted by all the powers. The questions that relate to a nation’s honor have not been legislated upon, and nearly all questions that pre-i cipitate war do relate to a nation’s honor. Even if a court of arbitration is established on the plan marked out, no nation is bound to accept the plan. Certainly iu the United States the scheme will have to be approved by the Senate. The proposal to declare the inviolability of private property during war on land and sea, and the proposal regulating the question of the bombardment of ports, towns and villages by naval forces, were referred to future conferences. The United States has especial cause for gratification and pride at the outcome of the proceedings at The Hague. Arbitration is a policy that this nation more than any other has been instrumental in inducing the world to adopt. In its principles and main 1 provisions, though not in details, the plan agreed upon at The Hague is in apeord with the propositions submitted by the Americans, which called for a tribunal, with voluntary arbitration, the award to be morally binding upon both parties after they have joined in an application for arbitration. In the dominating force of its ideas the United States has won recognition as a world power in the best sense of that term.