The citizen. (Frederick City, Md.) 1895-1923, 1896-01-31
NAVAL "TRUCE OF GOD.~
Shall the Ocean lie Made Free Com.
mon for All Nations?

Shall the Ocean lie Made a Free Com
mon for All Nations?
The test of war, SO long as it remains
inconclBSiVe, must mean experiments
of destruction terrible to conceive of.
arI ever leading on to vaster POSSIBLE
ties of ruin and expense. The tinalIty
in view means a condition under whiCl,
naval warfare stops, because either the
chance of victory or the possibility -
resistance has been eliminated from the
problem. The purpose of this paper is
to submit that this end is presently at
tainable by the combined action of the
chief maritime powers making the
ocean the free common for all nations
and declaring against its use for bellio
erent purposes. Land fighting will g"
on while the warlike passion remains
in the heart of man, but it seems FEAST
BILE that a perpetual truce of Goo"
should set apart the ocean. A great pee
vading system of international law nov
rules ocean traffic. Under mutual
treaties drawn up by Il maritime con
gress each power might agree to main
tain its quota of general navy for the
needs of maritime police service. Til;
would cover the chief utility of a navy
in time Of peace, the charting of coasts.
the planting of lighthouse and danger
signals, the scientific study and exper
iment which navigation profits by, the
work of rescue, the prevention and pun
ishment of crime on the high seas and
the destruction of derelicts. Such IL
united navy would enforce all DEGREES
of admiralty courts and would compel
the resort to arbitration in all the vexed
and ,eXing questions between sea
bounded people. If the chief naval
powers once entered into this plan all
the lesser ones would be constrained to
join The league. The obstacles which
stand in the way of a universal land fed
Grafton do not exist for nautical cor
federacy; for the sea is kingdom, an
empire or republic (as one may chooge
to style it, of and by itself. 1t has to
greater degree a community D
thought and feeling, an unwritten law
of usage and nautical homogeneiiy
rising above the bonds of race and
speech. The forecastle of almost every
ocean-going ship is cosmopolitan.
Then, again, owing to the larger use
of steam, navigation tends more and
more to settled routes. The fisheries,
are confined to narrower limits. The
coasting trade of nations, between Their
own terminal points, follows, of COURSE,
the one familiar track. The old mercan-
tile adventuring, in which ships were to
be found anywhere and everywhere, is
thing of the past, and much of the sea
is as solitary as painless forest. Henc.
the duty of an international navy coul,i
be concentrated with great advantas
at certain stations and along occ;:.
lanes. One can readily grasp the value
of sea patrol along the three-milc
wide track of transatlantic commerce
With ships of the highest exceIlcncs.
stored with provisions and supplies o
every sort, carrying salvage crews and
cruising with almost the precision o,
life-sagers of the coast guard as They
walk their beat on shore, he chances q
every shipWreckcd or distressed vessel
would be vastly Lcitered The dsereI:tt.
now one of the io;iaing perils Of these
would disappear from the st of E.nr.ila'