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23 Brit. Y.B. Int'l L. 1 (1946)
The Grotian Tradition in International Law

handle is hein.journals/byrint23 and id is 7 raw text is: THE GROTIAN TRADITION IN INTERNATIONAL LAW By PROFESSOR H. LAUTERPACHT Whewell Professor of International Law in the University of Cambridge THE tercentenary of the death of Grotius-he died on 29 August 1645- passed almost unnoticed in the literature of international law.' When com- pared with the solemn prominence accorded twenty years before to the three hundredth anniversary of the appearance of De Jure Belli ac Pacis, that absence of remembrance of a life so rich in fame and achievement is significant. It coincided with a period in which international law, after having survived the fiercest assault ever made upon it, proved as yet unable to impose its authority over the essentials of the new international system.7 At no time was it therefore more necessary than after the Second World War. to sustain hope by drawing inspiration from works in which principle has asserted itself against makeshifts. It is believed that instruction of this kind may still be derived from the ideas which Grotius bequeathed to inter- national law and which supply the key to the attraction and the influence of his treatise in the course of centuries. This is so although the principal work on which his fame rests may be faulty in its method, pretentious in its learning, and, unless it is studied with a sense of historic perspective, unreadable in the twentieth century. The object of this essay is to attempt to supply that perspective through an estimate of his teaching in the light of the enduring problems of international law. A survey of that nature is bound to show that the contribution of Grotius is more than a mere link in the evolution of thought; that there is about it a unity and a consistency which transcend its evasions and contradictions; that it is representative of the main problems with which international law has been confronted since its inception; and that, upon final analysis, the true value of his teaching is bound to assert itself over the repetitious and often uncritical adulation which has threatened to obscure the true import of his work. Admittedly, the significance of his achievement has been, and probably will remain, a subject of controversy. Although the criticism is unlikely to reach the low level of vituperation by Rousseau,3 and some lesser writers,4 Professor Lee's article in Law Quarterly Review, 62 (1946), pp. 53-7, is a notable exception. It was with some difficulty that the authors of the Charter of the United Nations were persuaded to assign to international law a place within the scheme of the United Nations. The view is widely held that, conceived in the spirit of realism, the Charter in many respects preferred order to law. 3 Contrat Social, Book I, chs. ii and iv. He reproaches Grotius with favouring tyrants and says: 'His constant way of reasoning is to establish law by reference to the facts' (ch. ii). See below, p. 45. 4 See, e.g., Dugald Stewart's outspoken criticism expressed in his first Dissertation on the Progress of Philosophy, and answered by Hallam, Introduction to the Literature of Europe (1839), vol. iii, pp. 439 ft. B

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