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The Green Bag

the beneﬁts of municipal home rule being sufﬁciently obvious without argu ment. The examination of the principles

applied in successfully governed Euro pean cities is rather superﬁcial, but the

book makes some sound and practical suggestions.

The author's conclusions,

in fact, are often better than the grounds assigned for them, and his book is of

little value as a scientiﬁc document. He sets out with the rather ambitious aim of proving that the faults of muni

facts. Citations are frequent, and there is a useful bibliography. THE BINDING FORCE OF INTER NATIONAL LAW The Binding Force of International Law. By A. Pearce Higgins. M.A.. LL.D., of Lincoln's Inn. Barrister-at-Law, Lecturer in Clare Collcgt. Cam bridge. Lecturer on Public International Law at the London School of Economics and the Royal Naval War College. University Press, Cambridge. and G. P. Putnam's Sons. New York. Pp. 48. (50 cts. ad.)

I-IIS brochure contains the inaugural lecture delivered by awell-known

cipal government, in the United States.

English scholar in connection with the

are due rather to failure to apply the principles underlying successful national and state government than to more deep-seated diﬂiculties, and it cannot be said that he succeeds in proving this, or that the problem of good city government is as free from intricacy as

opening of a course in international

he assumes.

Professor Munro's book is a pains taking and thorough account of muni cipal government in France, Prussia and England, describing with considerable

law at the London School of Economics last autumn. In general, it is a discus

sion of the basis of international law and a reply to the arguments that such

law has no

binding

sanction,

in which the subject of intema tional arbitration is considered in the light of recent developments in international affairs.

The writer does

not weaken his argument by claiming too much; he recognizes that existing

detail the systems of those countries

international law largely partakes of

and contrasting, wherever possible, their structure and functions with those of the United States. While the work does

character, but that it is gradually, by the process of deﬁnition by treaties

not pretend to be exhaustive, but aims

only to serve as an introduction to fuller study of the subject, it is suﬁi ciently elaborate to win approval for its scholarly and serviceable qualities. Professor Munro is concerned rather with structure and administration than

with functions of local government, and in its ﬁeld his treatise is the most com plete and instructive accessible to Ameri

can readers.

A conspicuous merit is

found in his use of the comparative method, and the discussions of the

workings of the various systems are so full as to give the reader something more satisfying than a bare statement of

a customary rather than of a positive

and international conferences, acquiring more and more of the attributes of positive law. Moreover, there is suffi cient evidence of its binding power in the fact that its mandates are re

spected by nations entering upon war, and there are numerous indications of the latent yet commanding force

of international public opinion. The eminently sane view is expressed that while the settlement of international questions by the application of the rules of law will tend to reduce the possibility of war, "even this advance in civiliza

tion will not necessarily mean

the

advent of an era of perpetual peace."