618 



NON-INTERVENTION AMONG NATIONS, THE PRINCIPLE OF. 



Nicaragua joined the Postal Union in 1882. 



MISCELLANEOUS. A steam soap-factory was 

 put in operation in Leon, and bids fair to prove 

 successful. 



A treaty of extradition with Colombia was 

 signed on July 3, 1882. 



In the United States increasing interest is 

 taken in the consummation of the Nicaragua 

 interoceanic canal route.* The Legislatures 

 and Boards of Trade of the Pacific States have 

 urged the Government to aid the scheme ; sub- 

 scriptions to stock in the canal were reported 

 as having been made in San Francisco, and it 

 was deemed probable that New Orleans would 

 warmly support that initiative. The promoters 

 of the enterprise announce their determination 

 to prosecute it, spite of puissant adversaries, 

 and to commence work at once in the event of 

 obtaining the three per cent guarantee which 

 they seek from the United States Government. 



NON-INTERVENTION AMONG NA- 

 TIONS, THE PRINCIPLE OF. SOME RE- 

 CENT VIEWS. The justice of the intervention 

 or non-intervention of the supreme authority 

 of one nation in the internal affairs of another 

 nation is one of those questions which occur 

 in the science of international law. Its solu- 

 tion in any case which may arise should, there- 

 fore, be found in the rules and customs recog- 

 nized in such law. What, then, is international 

 law ? The term " law " is generally defined to 

 be a rule of action prescribed by a superior, 

 and commanding what is right, and prohibiting 

 what is wrong. It is in consaquence of this 

 prescription of the superior that the obligation 

 to obedience arises in those on whom the law 

 is imposed, and the justness of the act com- 

 manded, and the unjustness of that prohib- 

 ited, is inferred. With a precise use of lan- 

 guage, therefore, it is evident that the term law 

 can not be applied to the science embraced in 

 international law, unless there is a superior to 

 prescribe its rules, and to decide relative to 

 the justice or injustice of actions. How can 

 this take place, since the subjects of interna- 

 tional law are sovereign nations, and the mat- 

 ter of its rules consists of their mutual relations 

 and actions? The earliest writers on the sci- 

 ence seem to have been aware of an impro- 

 priety in the use of such a designation. This 

 is indicated by the titles of their works. Thus 

 Grotius, regarded as the founder of the sci- 

 ence, entitled his book "On the Rights of 

 War and Peace." Hobbes afterward wrote 

 " De Give," or on citizenship ; and Puffendorf 

 called his distinguished work " Of the Law of 

 Nature and of Nations." He was followed 

 by Bynkershoek with "Questions on Public 

 Law," Wolf on " The Law of Nations," and 

 Vattel " On the Law of Nations." The term 

 " international law " was introduced by Jeremy 

 Bentham about 1790, and, notwithstanding 

 many objections by others, it has become gen- 

 erally accepted as the appropriate designation 

 of the science. But it would seem that the 

 * See u Annual Cyclopaedia" for 1881, p. 662. 



most perplexing points which came uuder the 

 consideration of these writers, were those 

 which treated of the prescriptive authority of 

 a law of nations, and of the obligation to obey 

 it. Both of these are necessary elements of a 

 law, and the position which they occupy in 

 international science is very distinctly stated 

 by Wheaton.* 



THE OBLIGATION or INTERNATIONAL LAW. 

 " There is no legislative or judicial authority, 

 recognized by all nations, which determines 

 the law that regulates the reciprocal relations 

 of states. The origin of this law must be 

 sought in the principles of justice applicable to 

 those relations. While in every civil society 

 or state there is always a legislative power 

 which establishes, by express declaration, the 

 civil law of that state, and a judicial power 

 which interprets that law and applies it to in- 

 dividual cases, in the great society of nations 

 there is no legislative power, and consequently 

 there are no express laws except those which 

 result from the conventions which states may 

 make with one another. As nations acknowl- 

 edge no superior ; as they have not organized 

 any common paramount authority for the pur- 

 pose of establishing, by an express declaration, 

 their international law; and as they have not 

 constituted any sort of Amphictyonic magis- 

 tracy to interpret and apply that law, it is 

 impossible that there should be a code of in- 

 ternational law illustrated by judicial interpre- 

 tations. The inquiry must then be, What are 

 the principles of justice which ought to regu- 

 late the mutual relations of nations that is to 

 say, from what authority is international law 

 derived? When the question is thus stated, 

 every publicist will decide according to his 

 own views, and hence the fundamental differ- 

 ences which we remark in their writings." 



ITS SOUECE OF AUTHORITY. The views of 

 various writers on the source of authority in 

 international law, and consequently of the ex- 

 tent of its obligatory force, are worthy of 

 notice. Grotius, the earliest of these writers, 

 sought to lay down certain rules of justice 

 which would be binding on men living in a 

 state of nature, independently of any positive 

 laws of human institution. These rules he 

 designated as natural law, and aimed to apply 

 them to mutual relations of separate commu- 

 nities living in a similar state with respect 

 to each other. The substance of international 

 law he thus makes to consist in certain rules 

 of justice, binding upon men in a state of 

 nature. These he designates as "natural law." 

 The source of these rules of justice, and the 

 ground upon which they rest for their obliga- 

 tory force, are brought forward in his defini- 

 tion of natural law. These rules, he says, are 

 the dictate of right reason, pronouncing that 

 there is in some actions a moral obligation, 

 and in other actions a moral deformity, arising 

 from their respective suitableness or repug- 



* " Elements of International Law," second annotated edi- 

 tion. 



