THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



57 



to be selected by it and to be under its 

 general direction. The German colonies 

 must thus be governed, and so, too, must 

 Constantinople and the country in its im- 

 mediate vicinity. 



INTERNATIONAL CONTROL FOR GERMAN 

 COLONIES 



It will not be satisfactory to all the 

 allies to turn either the German colonies 

 or Constantinople over to any nation. 

 Germany has forfeited her right to the 

 colonies by her mistreatment of them in 

 the past. She has been as murderous in 

 dealing with the backward tribes as she 

 was in Belgium and in northern France. 

 Were we to turn her colonies over to 

 Great Britain or France, it would soon 

 be charged that the trustee was exploit- 

 ing the colonies for the benefit of its 

 home people. 



The acquisition of these lands by one 

 or another government would give the 

 appearance of selfishness to the aims of 

 the allies in the war. 



What is true of the German colonies 

 is also true of Constantinople. It must 

 be internationalized. The Dardanelles, 

 the Sea of Marmora, and the Bosporus 

 must be under the guardianship of a 

 government that represents equally all 

 the allies who won this war. Only so 

 will the government be satisfactory. Only 

 so will the management secure peace. 



We must have, to make the treaty ef- 

 fective, a League of Nations with a court, 

 a Commission of Conciliation, joint eco- 

 nomic pressure and an agreement to use 

 military force, and an executive agency 

 to administer governments and trusts 

 which should be international in their 

 character. The situation, therefore, re- 

 quires the institution of a League of Na- 

 tions such as the American, English, and 

 French plans suggest. 



This is the natural way in which insti- 

 tutions are born and developed. Men do 

 not create them by academic discussion 

 and because of a general perception of 

 their usefulness. They are usually forced 

 into political existence by conditions 

 which defy the traditions of the past and 

 overcome by their inevitable character the 

 objections that conservative men oppose. 



Fortunately, the safest and most prac- 

 tical way to create a general League of 



Nations is through a limited League hav- 

 ing the Great Powers as its charter mem- 

 bers. 



It would be exceedingly difficult to call 

 a convention of all nations and therein 

 frame the constitution of the larger 

 league. The vanities and jealousies of 

 the smaller nations, whose life and peace 

 and happiness it is the chief purpose of 

 the general league to protect, would nev- 

 ertheless be very likely to prevent the 

 possibility of any such general organiza- 

 tion. 



SMALLER NATIONS MIGHT DEFEAT THE 

 PLAN 



The smaller nations would be so in- 

 sistent on a general and equal representa- 

 tion in the governmental branches of the 

 League as to defeat its organization on 

 any reasonable plan. 



During my administration there was 

 an attempt to create a World Court, and 

 the plan halted and failed because it was 

 impossible to agree with the smaller 

 nations to any feasible method of select- 

 ing the judges. Each nation insisted 

 that it should have a permanent member 

 of the court, and this would have required 

 a court of absurd and impracticable size, 

 like a town meeting, indeed. 



With the allied nations as charter 

 members, and with the protection to the 

 smaller nations that the League would 

 offer, the charter members can lay down 

 in advance the feasible lines upon which 

 a general league must be formed, and 

 then admit the other nations to the priv- 

 ileges of the League on condition of their 

 accepting its then structure. 



The branches of the League would 

 naturally be, first, a congress, or quasi- 

 legislative branch ; second, the court ; 

 third, the Council of Conciliation ; fourth, 

 the administrative agency, and, fifth, the 

 executive council. 



ALL NATIONS TO BE REPRESENTED IN 

 GENERAL CONGRESS 



All nations should be represented in 

 the general congress, but the representa- 

 tion should be determined by the charter 

 members in accordance with the popula- 

 tion, political importance, and responsi- 

 bility of each applicant. The congress 

 would enact and codify, subject to the 



