194 EMPLOYMENT OF THE PLEBISCITE [492 



forced to surrender them. While the term conquest has 

 been persistently avoided in the cases of enforced cession 

 without recourse to the principle of self-determination, 

 those annexations by the respective Allied Powers differ 

 neither in the method of nor in the motive for acquisition 

 from the territorial aggrandizements of the past. 



The conclusion is inevitable that the Peace Treaties end- 

 ing the World War have so far not established a universal 

 or even general practice of a settlement of territorial ques- 

 tions on the basis of the principle of self-determination by 

 the plebiscite. Nor have they eliminated acquisitions of 

 territory on the implied principle if not the expressed term 

 of conquest. 



Assuming that the ratification of the treaties by the con- 

 stitutional agencies of the countries involved does estab- 

 lish an international law the norms on which the treaty pro- 

 visions are built, we come to the inevitable conclusion that 

 these treaties have given international legal validity to a 

 practice which by the will of the one of two contending 

 parties, enforced upon the other, establishes the use of the 

 plebiscite in some territorial cessions and prohibits the ex- 

 pression of popular consent or disapproval in others. 



But even this assumption rests on premises of a prob- 

 lematic nature. The present treaties, though ratified, are 

 subject to amendment and replacement by other agreements 

 which may offer a different solution of the territorial ques- 

 tions involved, changing or reversing some of their present 

 stipulations. In fact, Article 19 of the League Covenant as 

 part of the Treaty of Versailles provides that the Assembly 

 of the League " may from time to time advise the recon- 

 sideration by the Members of the League of treaties which 

 have become inapplicable and the consideration of inter- 

 national conditions whose continuance might endanger the 

 peace of the world." 



Another consideration against the preceding assumption 

 is the fact that the United States Senate has twice voted 



