On the 15th of November, 1912, the United States and Great Britain formally ratified and put into effect an agreement which, in consequence of diplomatic negotiations covering nearly two years, had been signed by their plenipotentiaries on the 20th of July, 1912, adopting with certain modifications the rules and method of procedure embodied in the award of the North Atlantic Coast Fisheries Arbitration Tribunal, rendered at The Hague on September 7, 1910, under which all questions hereafter arising in regard to the exercise of American fishing liberties under the treaty of 1818 may be determined in accordance with the principles laid down in the award. This agreement constitutes the final step which was necessary to complete and perfect the arbitration award and give it practical application; and the award and this agreement together establish for all time the extent of the rights and obligations of the inhabitants of the United States in the exercise of thenfishing liberties under the treaty of 1818.

The Panama Canal project has its roots deep in the past. The diplomatic complications presented by the enterprise have been as difficult to overcome as the engineering obstacles. Now that the dream of ages is about to become a reality, certain of our newspapers, impressed with the magnitude of the task which the United States has undertaken and carried well-nigh to completion, are asking impatiently, what rights has Great Britain in the canal, why should she venture to dictate what use we shall make of our own property? Merely to say that England has rights under the Hay-Pauncefote treaty does not appear to satisfy these critics. They ask again, why did the United States ever give England any voice at all in the matter? In order to answer this question we have to go back to the middle of the last century when the Clayton-Bulwer treaty was negotiated and see what the relative positions of the United States and England with respect to the isthmus were at that time.

Neutralization is the imposition by international agreement of a condition of permanent neutrality upon lands and waterways.

The author of the essay 1 of which the foregoing is the opening sentence draws the following distinction between the neutrality and the neutralization of states (p. 1):

While simple neutrality is the condition of those states which in time of war take no part in the contest, but continue pacific intercourse with the belligerents, neutralization perpetuates this condition by means of treaties effected between several powerful nations and the neutralized state.

In a previous study I had occasion to state that the pacifist idea, as well as that of the juridical settlement of international conflicts, dates much farther back than is generally believed, and that it has had sincere advocates in all nations. And what is of even greater importance, international arbitration was practiced to a large extent, both in the Middle Ages and at the time of the Renaissance. I would now present to the enlightened readers of this Journal an Italian personage as one of these advocates, by stating however at the outset, that he lyas not the first among his compatriots, since four centuries before his time, the Venetian Marin Sanudo had consecrated his life to that idea, while the adherents of pacifism can even claim a Dante Alighieri among their number! For many reasons, however, which will be convincingly set forth in the course of these pages, Cardinal Alberoni is deserving of especial attention. The German Gerhoch, the Frenchmen Pierre Dubois and Eméric Crucé, the Czech king George Podiebrad, the Englishman W. Penn, the Portuguese Suarez, the Spaniard Vittoria, the Hollander H. Grotius, and many others, have in him a worthy associate, a fact which I hope will be made clear by the publication of his scheme, as an appendix hereof.

The following Scheme requires no other Recommendation, but to say, it was design’d by Cardinal Alberoni, a Genius form’d by Nature for the greatest and most extensive Enterprizes.

There is nothing that would please the writer more than to describe the international atmosphere in which the Opium Conference convened and proceeded to its deliberations and conclusions. That, however, must reside in memory for the present.

Abbreviations: Ann. sc. pol., Annates des sciences politiques, Paris; Ann. Vie Int., Annuaire de la Vie Internationale, Brussels; Arch, dipl., Archives Diplomatiques, Paris; B., boletin, bulletin, bolletino; P. A. U., bulletin of the Pan American Union, Washington; Clunet, J. de Dr. Int. Prive, Paris; Doc. dipl., France, Documents diplomatiques; B. Rel. Ext., Boletin de Relaciones Exteriores; Dr., droit, diritto, derecho; D. 0., Diario Oficial; For. rel., Foreign Relations of the United States; Ga., gazette, gaceta, gazzetta; Cd., Great Britain, Parliamentary Papers; Int., international, internacional, internazionale; J., journal; J. O.,

Journal Officiel, Paris; Vint. Sc, L’Internationalism Scientifique, The Hague; Mim. dipl., Memorial diplomatique, Paris; Monit., Moniteur beige, Brussels; N. R. G., Nouveau recueil generate de traites, Leipzig; Q. dipl., Questions diplomatiques et coloniales; R., review, revista, revue, rivista; Reichs G., Reichs-Gesetzblatt, Berlin; Stoats., Staatsblad, Groningen; State Papers, British and Foreign State Papers, London; Stat, at L., United States Statutes at Large; Titnes, the Times (London); Treaty ser., Great Britain, Treaty series.

Copyright benefits extended to Tunis, Proclamation. October 4, 1912. 1 p. (No. 1219.) State Department.