538 INTERNATIONAL LAW 



live, checked and controlled by the nation, which we have already 

 considered in its chief outlines; as ruler in Austria he wields - 

 or wielded at that time a power almost absolute, grown' of a 

 combination of feudal and Roman law, both unknown in Hungary. 

 There is no possibility of melting into one these two prerogatives so 

 widely different in origin and character. To that personal tie, 

 which only means that two different and distinct prerogatives are 

 vested in the same physical person, a solemn league and covenant 

 was added, a mutual obligation to assist each other against foreign 

 aggression. 1 Is there anything in the nature of such a covenant 

 which should of necessity impair the independence of the nations 

 who are parties to it? That, now, depends wholly on the form of 

 the transaction, on the sources from which it derives its binding 

 character, on the forces which insure its execution. Should that 

 obligation to mutual defense have been laid upon Hungary by a power 

 outside of her own public powers and superior to them, or should 

 there be any sort of such superior legal organization able to enforce 

 its execution against Hungary's free will or to interpret its meaning 

 in a way binding upon her, then, indeed, Hungary would be no more 

 a sovereign nation. But of all this there is not even a trace. Hun- 

 gary entered that compact of mutual defense by an act of her sov- 

 ereign will, and its execution as well as its interpretation - - let me 

 emphasize this point, because it absolutely settles the question 

 depends entirely on her good faith and on her discretion. Neither 

 before, nor in, nor after the solemn transaction called " Pragmatic 

 Sanction " will anybody be able to discover even the trace of some 

 power superior to the public powers of Hungary, entitled to control 

 her, able to force on her what she does not choose to accept or to do. 

 Now this way of entering and of keeping compacts exactly answers 

 to the idea of national sovereignty. We shall see later on that these 

 characteristic features of our legal status suffered no alteration 

 whatever through more recent transactions. 



To give more weight to the present comments on the Pragmatic 

 Sanction I shall quote its authentic interpretation given in a law 

 enacted by the Hungarian legislature in 1791, after an attempt of 

 Joseph II to subvert the constitution. In Hungary, as in England, 

 laws of this kind, reasserting and putting into evidence national or 

 popular rights, generally follow practical encroachments on those 

 rights; their purpose is not to create but to declare law; to this 

 family of declaratory laws, the most celebrated scions of which are 



1 It is generally admitted that the Pragmatic Sanction, with all its enactments, 

 has the character of a bilateral compact between the Hungarian nation and the 

 reigning dynasty. Most authorities of public law hold it to be at the same time 

 a compact between Hungary and Austria, the latter having been represented on 

 its conclusion by her (then) absolute ruler. But as this is controversial matter, 

 the author, though holding the first-mentioned opinion, did not think fit to insist 

 upon it in the text; his argument holds good on either supposition. 



