Page:The League of Nations and freedom of the seas.djvu/10

 question of Freedom of the Seas does not arise. As an article in the programme it is redundant and paradoxical.

The truth is that even the most devoted and sanguine advocates of a League of Peace realize that a complete extinction of war by that means is not to be expected. It is more than can be believed—at least until human nature has mellowed much farther—that all the nations of the earth will bind themselves never to go to war for any cause whatever, or entirely to abandon force as a means of defending themselves against attack. There must arise cases in which a League of Nations could not prevent war, and would not deem it just to prevent it; and it is presumably to meet such exceptional cases that Freedom of the Seas has become attached to the League of Nations. The intention doubtless is at once to mitigate the severity of the struggle as between the intractable belligerents and prevent the contest interfering with those who are no party to it. If this were the end of the proposed restriction nothing but good could come of it, and it would in no way be incompatible with the active existence of a League of Nations; but we have only to examine the actualities of Naval Warfare and the effect which Freedom of the Seas would have upon them to see that it is very far from the end. Its effect would reach much farther.

As used by its most pronounced advocates, Freedom