The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1904-01-21
ARBITRATION DISCUSSED
BY JUDGE v. l.PENHELD
BEFORE BAR ASSOCIATION
Nineteenth Century Civilization
Crowned by The Hague Tri-
bunal, He Says.
GREAT PROGRESS MADE
In Doing Away with War, and
Greater Advance May Yet Be
Accomplished.

ALBANY, N. Y, Jan. 20.-Willam L..
Penfeld, solicitor of the State Department,
delivered an address to-day before the
New York State Bar Association. His
topic was Some Problems of International
Arbitration" Judge Penfield prefaced his
address by saying that the Bar Associa-
ton of the State of New York laid before
the President of the United States in 1896
a memorial which contains the essential ba-
sis on which The Hague tribunal was
founded. He discussed at length the de-
fects in the tribunal and its work, and con-
tinuing. said:
THE formation Of the federal Constitu-
ton and the creation of the Supreme Court
of the United States marked the high tide
of the civilization of the eighteenth CEN
fury. The adoption of The Hague con-
vention and the creation of the Permanent
Court of Arbitration signalized and
crowned the civilization of the nineteenth
century. Each was the logical outcome of
antecedent institutions. of the compulsive
force of circumstances and of the exigent
needs of a rising civilization.
In the resort to arbitration tribunals, as
to the judicial courts, experience has dem
onstrated that there is a certain class of
1900
in the sphere of arbitraI or judicial de-
cision. We do not and could not submit to
the decision of the courts-not even to the
Supreme Court of the United States-mere
questions of national policy, domestic or
foreign. We do not submit to the consid-
GRAFTON of the judiciary the questions of
what shall be our fiscal economic poll
cies, what shall be the form of our govern
ment, what our course shall be in the ORR
ent or on this continent-with respect to
the Monroe doctrine, for example We
could, 10 be sure, by constitutional amend
ments, delegate the consideration and de-
cision of all questions of domestic or even
foreign policy to the Supreme Court of the
United States, but such delegation of power
would unite in one body the executive, leg
islative and judicial functions and would
end by converting the court into Vene-
tan oligarchy.
I'm a general way IL may be said that the
question of whether all controversies of ev-
cry nature between nations will eventually
be submitted to arbitration cannot be an
swered by a facie reference 20 the per-
versitieS of human nature nor to tributes
paid by military cheftains to the regenerat-
ing and civiliZing influence of war. 1t may
and can be reasonably answered by asking
in lawyerlike fashion, as in a controversy
between individuals, whether the case is in
its nature fit for the political or judicial
branch of the government to decide. The
solution, of course depends on the nature
of the controversy. While ii would be too
much to expect the submission to interna-
tional arbitration of questions which are
radically of a political nature, we are justi-
fed in the hope of an increasing limitation
of the resort to war by means of arbitration
even of certain political controversies
PROOF OF PROGRESS
Mr.. Penfed said that the recent submis-
sion to The Hague tribunal of the Vene-
zuelan matter was a proof of the progress
of the cause of international arbitration.
In conclusion he said: There is another
int
full solution The Hague tribunal should
greatly facilitate, or, perhaps, accomplish
1t has not remote bearing on an American
policy known as the Monroe doctrine, and
has a bearing on question which directly
concerns the Latin-American states, and
more or less concerns the relations of the
United States 10 those states and the states
of the old world. 1t is the question of the
collection of indemnities from American
debtor states The records of foreign Of
fees abundantly prove that weak debtor
states have too often been subjected by
military force to the payment of exorbitant
indemnities. The fact cannot be questioned
and it cannot be blinked. 1t must be recog-
nized and dealt with accordingly. The ac
ton of a civilized creditor state arbitrarily
enforcing the payment OF exorbitant de-
mands against a debtor state because it is
weak and because it is misgoverned is even
less defensible than the wrongful action of
the debtor state which counts on impunity
for its wrongdoing because il is weak The
latter, in its blindness and weakness, may
indulge the delusion that the Monroe doc
trine will shield il in wrOngdoing. The for
mer, more enlightened, is. perhaps, aroused
TO resentment by a gross disregard shown
for the rules and amenities which should
govern the intercourse of nations and one
wrongful act of violence is sometimes sue
ceeded by another and more fragrant wrong
THE door Of The Hague tribunal is al
ways open for the redress of all such
grievances against debtor states, and an
offer courteously made and firmly insisted
on by creditor states to submit their COM
plants TO its determination cannot be final
ly rejected. If war is ever morally justi-
fable il is when made to compel a defend
ant state to accept the process of an i'm
partial arbitral tribunal The state that is
in the wrong will suffer an adverse judg-
ment, and the precedent set by powerful
states in voluntary appeal and the sub
mission to the arbitrament of reason in
stead of war will be eventually and gladly
followed by the weaker members of the
family of nations. If The Hague tribunal
with the help of the influence of the United
States. shall, il may, be the means of
accomplishing that result the last Vestige
of a pretense for the Intervention of Eu-
ropean states on this continent will have
disappeared