318 SYMPOSIUM ON INTERNATIONAL LAW. 



Swiss might prove feasible of organization and successful of opera- 

 tion. From the political point of view, however, such an arrange- 

 ment could hardly satisfy in the long run the ambitions of Russia 

 to hold in her own hands the best natural gateway to the Empire. 

 The uncertainty that an international administration would be able, 

 though willing, to effectively guarantee the security and the facilities 

 demanded by so great an Empire, would doubtless constrain Russia 

 to vigorously oppose any such arrangement. However that may 

 be, if it be granted that Constantinople and its approaches should 

 be internationalized, such an arrangement would be necessarily of 

 an abnormal, exceptional character. 



Other abnormal forms of international administration are to 

 be found in the foreign Sanitary Board, and the Dette Publique of 

 Constantinople. Imposed on the Turks to guard against dangerous 

 epidemics, and to protect the financial interests of European in- 

 vestors, these two institutions, respectively, have been an affront to 

 Ottoman national pride, and cannot claim a permanent existence. 

 The Dette Publique, incidentally, raises the interesting question 

 whether there should be an international bankruptcy law which 

 would permit of placing an entire nation in the hands of receivers 

 for the benefit of all foreign creditors, instead of the hands of the 

 loan sharks of one nation which for political reasons may have 

 encouraged such loans. The Sanitary Board, likewise, suggests the 

 question whether nations should not be authorized to intervene in 

 the affairs of any nation which may be criminally negligent in 

 matters involving the health of neig-hboring peoples. 



Other special instances of abnormal administration are to be 

 found in the mixed courts of Egypt for the trial of cases affecting 

 foreigners, and in the foreign settlements of Shanghai, Canton, and 

 Tientsin. It is certainly of interest to note that in countries where 

 extraterritorial privileges still exist, foreigners have found effective 

 ways, even while their respective nations are at war, to administer 

 their common municipal settlements, and adjudicate their legal dif- 

 ferences. Such arrangements, however — it must be repeated — can 

 only be regarded as temporary and exceptional in character. 



Of much more vital interest and significance from the point of 

 view of international administration are those numerous and highly 



