Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 18.pdf/411

 38o

THE GREEN BAG

principle of international politics, such as the balance of power, in their conduct towards American states, it has rested in part on the difference in the political systems of the two continents, and, in part, on the failure to recognize that the American states are to-day independent and free and as fully entitled to have their sovereignty respected as the older states of Europe. He further concludes that the intervention of Europe in the affairs of different American states has not rested on any legitimate foundation, and that it cannot be invoked as a precedent of the least authority, but that, on the con trary, it has constituted the most regrettable use offeree and merits, being condemned by history as it already has been by all the publicists and men of affairs who have not been blinded by a false patriotism. The right to pecuniary indemnity he then leaves for consideration to a subsequent section of his work dealing with the mutual duties of states, but in parting says: "We will content ourselves here with remarking that, according to strict inter national right, the recover}' of debts and the pursuit of private claims does not justify de piano the armed intervention of governments, and that, as European states invariably follow this rule in their recipro cal relations, there is no reason why they should not follow it also in their relations with nations of the new world." Here we find a much broader doctrine than any Senor Drago emphasizes in his note. Here the distinction between injuries and the non-payment of debts is swept away entirely, and the broad claim advanced that private claims, whether arising in tort or contract, should not be made the basis of armed intervention. This broad doctrine is properly the "Calvo Doctrine," and not the narrower one expressed in Senor Drago 's note. John Macdonell, in an able article in The Nineteenth Century, for April, 1903, calls it "the corner-stone of the so-called American public law," on which South American writers are wont so strenuously

to insist. It behooves us then to examine into the applications Calvo makes of this doctrine to see whither he would lead us. On page 231, of volume six, of his "Le Droit International" we find the following: "It is certain that strangers who establish themselves in a country have the same right to protection as the nationals, but they ought not to pretend to a protection more extended. If they suffer any wrong they ought to count on the government of the country pursuing the delinquents, and ought not to claim from the state to which the authors of the violence belong any pecun iary indemnity." And on page 140 of volume three he says: "The rule that, in more than one case, it has been attempted to impose on American states is that strangers merit more consider ation and regard and privileges more marked and extended than those accorded even to the nationals of the country where they reside." In uttering this complaint Calvo only reiterates what time and time again South American governments and writers have inveighed against with all the ardor of the Latin race. In it lies the crux of the whole matter. Where the laws of a country afford adequate remedies and do not conflict with the law of nations, where, in short, sub stantial justice can be obtained, it would indeed, as Calvo says, be unwarranted to pass by the remedies provided by the laws of the country and seek redress through diplomatic action; but where such is not the case, where, for instance, the courts are notoriously under the control of an unprin cipled dictator, so that an appeal to them would be a mockery and sham, it would indeed be a perversion of justice for an alien to be confined to his remedy in them even though a citizen of the country should have no other. Back of Calvo 's complaint, no doubt, is the conviction that European countries have been too ready to assume the latter situation to be true in LatinAmerican countries, and verv likely such