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1 Sanction of International Law, April 24, 1908 1908

handle is hein.beal/fienif0001 and id is 1 raw text is: The Sanction of International Law, April 24, 19O8. ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY, MR. ELIHU ROOT, OF WASHINGTON, D. C. One accustomed to the administration of municipal law who turns his attention for the first time to the discussion of practical questions arising between nations and dependent upon the rules of interna- tional law, must be struck by a difference between the two systems which materially affects the intellectual processes involved in every discussion, and which is apparently fundamental. The proofs and arguments adduced by the municipal lawyer are addressed to the object of setting in motion certain legal machinery which will result in a judicial judgment to be enforced by the entire power of the state over litigants subject to its jurisdiction and con- trol. Befoie him lies a clear, certain, definite conclusion of the controversy, and for the finality and effectiveness of that conclusion the sheriff and the policeman stand always as guarantors in the last resort. When the international lawyer, on the other hand, passes from that academic discussion in which he has no one to convince but him- self, and proceeds to seek the establishment of rights or the redress of wrongs in a concrete case, he has apparently no objective point to which lie can address his proofs or arguments, except the conscience and sense of justice of the opposing party to the controversy. In :nly rare, exceptional and peculiar cases, do the conclusions of the international lawyer, however, clearly demonstrated, have behind them the compulsory effect of possible war. In the vast majority of practical questions arising under the rules of international law there does not appear on the surface to he any reason why either party hould abandon its own contention or yield against its own interest to the arguments of the other side. The action of each party in yield- ing or refusing to yield to the arguments of the other appears to be entirely dependent upon its own will and pleasure. This apparent absence of sanction for the enforcement of the rules of international law has led great authority to deny that those rules are entitled to be called law at all; and this apparent hopelessness of finality carries to

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