July 17, 1915. 
LAND AND WATER. 
permits this unfair traffic of arms and munitions, 
so long \yill we German Americans not ask 
Germany to spare boats with such cargoes." One 
of the resolutions that v.as passed with acclama- 
tion said : " American manufacturers have, 
during a year, supplied the eight nations of the 
British Alliance with weapons against the three 
nations of the Teutonic Alliance. To confess that 
it would be unneutral to throw all the belligerents 
on their own resources is to confess a partiality 
which discredits all our professions of neutrality." 
As if it were the American Government, and not 
private American firms, that are sending muni- 
tions. Surely muddleheadedness could go no 
farther. 
The complications to which " contraband," 
" conditional contraband," and the " doctrine of 
the continuous voyage," and so forth, have given 
rise, make most laymen recoil from the discussion 
of Prize Law. But the essentials of the matter 
are really quite simple. The fundamental fact to 
bear in mind is that the sea, being no country's 
property, is a highway theoretically open to all in 
times of war. If the unarmed ships of a bel- 
ligerent put to ssa, they may be stopped by the 
armed ships of another belligerent, and their ebips 
and cargoes be confiscated. But whatever their 
cargo, it is no military offence to put to sea, and 
neither crews nor passengers may be injured. 
And this holds good whether the unarmed ship is 
trading with an allied belligerent or with a 
neutral Power. 
Neutrals are absolutely free to trade with 
other neutrals and conditionally free to trade 
with either belligerent. They can only be 
stopped by the other belligerent and searched, so 
that the neutrality of their cargo can be proved. 
If a neutral ship is carrying pianos, snuff, and 
flowered silk, and its passengers are dancing- 
masters and bi.shops, it will be allowed to go on its 
way undisturbed. The cargo is manifestly inno- 
cent. If it carries arms, explosives, and remounts, 
and its passengers are enemy generals and 
reservists, it will be taken into port, because the 
cargo is manifestly intended to assist the enemy's 
armed forces, and is " contraband of war." But 
the ship is not an enemy ship, and even with 
appearances so much against it, it and its cargo 
will not be a lefjal capture and confiscated until 
the question is tried before a duly constituted 
court, which hears counsel and sworn evidence, 
and follows accepted law in giving its decision. 
If the neutral ship carries such things as 
food, or copper, or other raw material from which 
munitions may be made, even if these are destined 
for a neutral port, or consigned to a private in- 
dividual, it is open to the suspicion that they may 
ultimately be intended for the enemy's forces. 
And the ship may be brought to port so that the 
neutral can remove this suspicion by legal process 
before he goes free. But however warlike his 
cargo, and, consequently, however unneutral his 
action, the only penalty that can be attached to 
laira is the arrest of his ship and the confiscation 
of his car^o. As in the case of belligerents, so in 
the case ot neutrals, the lives of the crew and pas- 
sengers must be absolutely respected. 
Note here that neutral traders act for them- 
selves only. Thsy do not involve their country. 
[When Mr. Bryan's resolution spoke of " our " pro- 
fessions of neutrality, he mixed up national with 
private action. It follows from these principles 
that neutrals travelling in unarmed belligerent 
trading ships, are just as safe as if they were 
travelling in their own ships. They take the 
risk of being stopped and taken to an enemy port, 
but whatever the cargo in the belligerent ship, 
they are guilty of no offence, their lives may not 
be threatened, and established custom throws on 
the belligerent that catches them the obligation to 
do all that is possible to return them to their hemes 
or forward them to their destinations. 
The controversy between Washington and 
Berlin arises from the fact that the right of 
search, which Germany possesses equally with all 
other belligerent Powers, is useless to her, because 
search, and its logical consequence of taking the 
ship into a German port, can only be carried out if 
German surface ships were free of the sea. But 
as no German cruiser can appear upon the sea at 
aH, her Navy can only be represented on the ocean 
by submarines, which are not large enough to 
carry prize crews, and if they were, the prize 
crews could not get the captured ship past our 
cruisers into a German port. If, then, Germany 
wishes to injure British sea-borne trade and put 
an end to Britisli imports — both perfectly legiti- 
m.ate objects of war^ier only means of doing so is 
by sinking the ships carrying these imports, wiiich 
is an entirely illegitimate means of gaining her 
end. 
In other words, she cannot carry on an attack 
on our trade and observe the rules as set out above. 
In many cases where the coast was clear the 
captains of the submarines have warned the ships 
coming to or leaving British ports and given the 
crews and passengers the doubtful chance of 
escape that is involved in taking to the boats. But 
in quite as many cases — as happened with the 
Lusitania — the ship has been sunk on sight, and 
the escape of the passengers and crew left purely 
to chance. Between forty and fifty neutral ships 
have been thus sunk, including some American 
ships, and the lives of many thousands of neutrals 
have been jeopardised and the lives of some 
hundreds, including some scores of Americans, 
been lost. The American protest arises out of 
the fact that these neutral Americans were 
exercising an acknowledged right in travelling 
either in belligerent or neutral unarmed ships, 
and were killed in defiance of every law of 
humanity and morals. Germany replies that, as 
she can make no other counter-stroke to the 
British embargo on her trade, it follows that this 
counter-stroke can legitimately be used. It is 
the argument of the militant Sufi'ragette. America 
has called upon her categorically to abandon this 
procedure. Germany, with an explicitness that 
leaves nothing to be desired, declines to accept 
American dictation. Between any two other 
countries the issue could only be war. It remains 
to be seen whether President Wilson will fiiid an 
alternative. 
So far as the British and Allied interests 
are concerned the situation, in any event, is en- 
tirely to our advantage. The American j)rotesfc 
puts the criminality of the German proceedings 
on record with a conclusiveness which the whole 
civilised world acknowledges and posterity w^ill 
certainly endorse. Despite the noisy cheers with 
which certain German papers have greeted the 
official attitude, the minds of many thousands of 
.Germans must be gravely disturbed. 
The issues between Great Britain an.i Wasli- 
ington are only questions of law. I f m these we 
are proved to be wrong the matter can be met 
11 
