Some Moral Aspects of Neutrality

Extract

THE war in Europe and our own declared neutrality make the discussion of this subject particularly timely. Much is being said and written on the question as to what is the best procedure to maintain this neutrality: whether we should retain our embargo on arms or not, and whether if lifted or not, we should demand that cash payments be made by all belligerents who purchase goods from us, and that these goods be transported in vessels sailing under the flags of the nations that purchase them. A point which both parties in the controversy try to make is that if their solution is accepted we shall be less likely drawn into war ourselves. Into the merits of this debate we shall not enter. It is one of practical politics, concerned, not directly with the declaration of neutrality or with its justification, but with maintaining such relations with the belligerents as will best safeguard our national rights and most effectively prevent our being drawn out of our neutral status and into the war on one side or the other. The aim of the present paper is rather to examine the conception of neutrality itself, and under its moral, rather than under its immediately legal aspects. Legal justice is not always synonymous with moral justice, and over-insistence on our legal rights is liable to cause us to forget our moral duties of justice and of charity.