322 EDMUNDS-— INTERNATIONAL ARBITRATION. [May 21, 



nent and able gentlemen expressed within a year or two) that there 

 is such a thing as international law that is just as binding upon 

 independent nations in every sense as is municipal law upon the 

 individuals composing a State. It is true that this international 

 law cannot be adjudged in particular cases by a preestablished tri- 

 bunal or executed by a sheriff or constable. But it is not the less 

 binding upon the moral sense or honor (if there be any difference 

 in the expression) of every nation having relations with another. 



The progress of civilization has been such that nations have 

 come more and more to feel the necessity of, and their obligation 

 to obey, the fundamental principles of justice that every one will 

 admit exist between individual men in a state of nature. Men in 

 a state of nature have found that they could not exist safely and 

 make progress without the establishment of associations respecting 

 common rights and duties which we call States. Thus associated, 

 they bear the same relations as States to each other that they bore 

 toward each other in a state of nature ; that is, the duties of justice 

 and right. In their formation of States as between each other, 

 they have agreed to establish tribunals to determine rights and to 

 establish authority to compel respect of such rights. The law of 

 nations imposes the same duties and obligations between nations, 

 but it lacks the compulsory power referred to. 



This state of things, then, leads at once, and logically, to inter- 

 national arbitration. 



I think no one can state a difference in principle between the 

 duties of men toward each other in an organized State and the 

 duties of nations toward each other, although they do not have a 

 federation possessing the power of judgment and coercion through 

 tribunals appointed to decide and powers authorized to execute the 

 decision. 



Thus, in the present condition of the world, international arbi- 

 tration is the only resource short of the ultima ratio regimt through 

 which disputes between nations that shall have failed to be adjusted 

 through diplomatic means can be determined. 



Why is it that it so often happens that arbitration in the place of 

 war does not take place ? It is obviously for the reason that the 

 various organized nations of the world are so suspicious of each 

 other that they are not willing to submit their differences to any 

 common tribunal in the brotherhood of nations. 



Take, for illustration, the present condition in eastern Europe 



