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Procedure Under the Minorities Treaties

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2017

Julius Stone
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Extract

It is not necessary to make a profound study of the work of the League of Nations in the sphere of minorities protection to realize the importance of the I Minorities Section of the Secretariat, of the minorities petition and of the Minorities Committees (usually called “the Committees of Three”). Indeed it is difficult to imagine how the guarantee of the League could have been given substantial reality without these three institutions. At first sight it would appear remarkable that the treaty articles upon which the present procedure is based should make not the slightest mention of any provision concerning these institutions. This is nevertheless the fact. All the rules (with only one exception) concerning the functions of the Minorities Section and of the Minorities Committees and the nature of the minorities petition have been established unilaterally by resolution of the Council.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 26 , Issue 3 , July 1932 , pp. 502 - 513
Copyright
Copyright © by the American Society of International Law 1932

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References

1 The resolution of June 27, 1921. Minutes of Thirteenth Session of the Council, pp. 51 and 235–6.

2 The procedure for modification of the treaties, and other cognate legal questions, as well as the entire procedure in minorities questions, are examined in a forthcoming study by the present writer entitled International Guarantees of Minority Rights, Oxford, 1932.

3 Para. 3 of Art. 12 of the Polish treaty, and the analogous provisions of the other undertakings, providing for the submission to the Permanent Court of disputes between states members of the Council and the state concerned, do not concern the procedure of the Council, and are not in point in the present discussion.

4 The following states are bound by treaty provisions framed on the Polish model : Austria, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Hungary, Roumania, The Kingdom of the Serbs-Croats and Slovenes, Turkey. The following states are bound by declarations made before the Council, which, in spite of verbal differences, and differences of arrangement in the last two cases, seem to give the same result as the Polish text: Albania, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia. It is impossible to examine these differences here.

5 See report of the committee appointed under the chairmanship of M. Adatci (Japan), to report on proposed reforms in the procedure for the protection of minorities, League of Nations Official Journal, Supplement No. 73, pp. 53 et seq.

6 League of Nations Official Journal, Supplement No. 73, pp. 53 et. seq. See also the Assembly resolution of Sept. 21, 1922, on this work, Third Assembly Records, Plenary Meetings, pp. 134–5.

7 Report of Council to the 6th Assembly (Para. VI of Cap. 7 of the Supplementary Report), Official Journal, 1926, p. 301.

8 Report of M. Tittoni and resolution of Oct. 22, 1920. Minutes of the Tenth Session of the Council, pp. 13, 142–5.

9 See Adatci Report, Supplement No. 73, pp. 53–64. For examples of petitions from various sources, see Stone, op. cit., Chap. III.

10 Ibid., p. 56.

11 Under Art. 4, para. 5 of the Covenant. Their “interest” was not, however, the fact that they were bound by minorities treaties, but that the discussion was about memoranda submitted by them. See Official Journal, April, 1929, p. 512 footnote.

12 The adhesions were given by letter. For list, see note of the Secretary-General in Official Journal, January, 1922, p. 51. See, also, Supplement No. 73, p. 51.

13 These modifications were two in number: 1. The President of the Council may extend the period of two months for the submission of the comments of the state concerned fixed by the resolution of June 27, 1921. 2. The communication of petition and comments is restricted to members of the Council. Communication is also to be made to other states or to the general public at the request of the state concerned or by a special resolution of the Council.

14 See Official Journal, April, 1929, p. 512.

15 Paragraph 1.

16 Supplement No. 73, pp. 56–57.

17 See Supplement No. 73, pp. 35 et seq.

18 Since the committees keep no minutes, it is difficult to discover which case this was.

19 A phrase of M. Hym ans (Belgium). See Minutes of the 10th Session of the Council, p. 15, Meeting of Oct. 23, 1920.

20 See Minutes of the 10th Session of the Council, p. 15, Meeting of Oct. 23, 1920. See, also, ibid., “It was agreed that the suggestions of M. Hymans should be adopted as a rule of procedure of the Council and that the legal advisors of the Council should find a formula whereby this procedure may be reconciled with the text of the treaties.”

21 It may be remarked that this wording confirms the present view of the nature of the petition.

22 Now sometimes four, see resolution of June 13, 1929. Official Journal, 1929, p. 1005.

23 Para. 4 of the resolution of Sept. 5, 1923. Official Journal, 1923, p. 1296.

24 The committees have acquired what may be called a third function, namely, that of informal negotiation with the states concerned with a view to inducing them to make good the alleged infraction without making resort to the Council necessary. This function is not, however, based on any Council resolution and merely arises out of the freedom of individual members of the Council, whether on the committee or not, to have friendly conversations with the state concerned. For this reason it is not here dealt with. It must, however, be borne in mind if it is desired to obtain a complete picture of the work of the committees. See para. VI of Cap. 7, of the Supplementary Report of the Council to the 6th Assembly. Official Journal, 1926, pp. 300–1. See, also, Adatci Report, Supplement No. 73, pp. 59–60, and 63.

25 The reluctance to use the words “Minorities Committee” collectively may be noted. The resolution speaks inaccurately of the Committee of Three since, after 1929, the number may be five. See also note 34.

26 This is the first Council resolution which uses the word “committee” to describe the ephemeral bodies created under the resolution of Oct. 25, 1920. Even after taking this step, doubts as to its advisability are still indicated by the careful use of “members of the Minorities Committees” instead of simply “the committees.” This reluctance to describe the Minorities Committees as ordinary committees has a sound justification.

27 When a question is placed on the Council’s agenda the documents automatically become public.

28 The word “committee” was used by M. Hymans, the originator of the idea of the Minorities Committees. (See Minutes of the 10th Session of the Council, p. 15, Meeting of Oct. 23, 1920.) It was carefully suppressed by the legal advisors of the Council when they framed the resolution of Oct. 25, 1920. It was never used before the resolution of June 13, 1929, and even there is prefixed by the words “members of.”

29 See, for example, Art. 12 of the Polish Minorities Treaty.

30 The circumstances are as follows:

If the Acting-President of the Council is

The representative of a state of which the persons belonging to the minority in question are subjects, or

The representative of a neighboring state of the state to which the persons belonging to the minority in question are subjects; or

The representative of a state the majority of whose population belongs from the ethnical point of view to the same people as the persons belonging to the minority in question….

31 See for discussions on this resolution, Official Journal, April, 1929, p. 521, and Supplement No. 73, p. 21, and p. 9, speech of Dr. von Schubert.

32 Report of the Council to the 6th Assembly (Para. VI of Cap. 7 of the Supplementary Report), Official Journal, 1926, p. 301.

33 This phrase must be read in the light of the foregoing remarks as to the informatory nature of the minorities petition.

34 A slight emendation has been made in the words (though not the sense) of the report, which speaks of “the committee” in the singular. It has been thought better to substitute the plural to avoid any possible misunderstanding. There is no one Minorities Committee, since a separate one is appointed for each petition.

35 The report was given in 1925.

36 See Official Journal, July, 1929, p. 1168.

37 Document C. 98.1929, V. Official Journal, 1929, pp. 511–12. The question submitted to the learned jurists was whether Lithuania was entitled to a seat on the Council under Article 4, para. 5 of the Covenant when a question of procedure under the minorities treaties and declarations was being discussed. The question of the mode in which rules of procedure may be established was naturally involved, because, if the consent of the states concerned was necessary for the establishment of such rules, Lithuania might be said to have a special interest within para. 5. As a matter of fact, the jurists decided that even when the consent of the states concerned was necessary, those states were not “interested” within the paragraph. Their consent would only be sought after the Council had taken its own decision. As to the mode of coming to this agreement, see the latter part of the Jurists’ Report.

37a For criticism, see Stone, op. cit., Chapter II.

38 See Official Journal, July, 1930, pp. 827–828.

39 See Official Journal, May, 1930, p. 386.