The Ward County independent., 1921-12-22

view point of the historical associ-
ations, the legal rights, the wishes of
the people of the island and the eco
nomic and political rights of the two
countries concerned. It was finally
awarded to Finland with certain con-
ditions attached thereto. Sweden
reluctantly accepted the decision and
the preparations for war were aban-
doned.
In September of this year, for the
second time an overwhelming majority
of the worlds nations met together
under written constitution at the As
sembly of the League of Nations ana
lysing the efforts put forth in the
meeting. 1t was an amazingly COM
plicated question. Very few of us
looked at it from the same view point.
Some expected the League to work
miracles; others looked to it to cause
disaster, and what appeared salts
factory to one was considered value
less by another. A great number of
people failed to see that the League
was an ensemble, some parts of which
may be eminently successful while
other parts are sheer failures. To
judge it, we must see it in the broad
whole. Unfortunately, ones felings
of bewilderment and uncertainty are
apt only to increase if one steps out in
the journalists gallery overlooking the
Assembly. Let us look down for a
minute on that sea of faces come to-
gether from the four corners of the
globe: let US check over the national
nameplates on the desks of the fifty
1nln lat Ind
alongside a Canadian, Siamese
alongside Swiss, Chinaman next to
Bulgarian. Surely it seems impos-
sible that any such medley of races,
colors and view points can ever arrive
at common decision. Let us, how
ever, go down on the floor for NOM
ent amongst the delegations and look
up towards the Presidential rostrum.
Alongside it and behind it we see an
equally great medley of races which,
during the past two years, have been
welded together into the international
Secretariat. They have learned to
work together, not only during the AS
sembly, but day by day throughout the
whole year and stand perhaps as the
advance guard of the world unity
which centuries hence may come to
pass. And as We look about, back
from the Secretariat to the national
delegations, we begin to hope that all
this is leading onwards. But whittier :?
Irresistibly that question rushes to
mind. Very likely at that moment
some orator is urging the need of
haste and decision in order to prevent
the Assembly from degenerating into
a mere. debating society. That is an
easily grasped idea, especially as it
fits in with both precedent and our own
preoccupations. But it is apt to be
shattered when another orator shortly
/ afterwards urges caution in order to
prevent the Assembly from developing
into a superb -Parliment. Obviously,
the final key to the meeting cannot be
| found in an instant; it lies hidden
away, as most things worth the seek
ing, where it can be found only by con-
( siderable 5 effort. One fact, however,
stands out. The world never before
has had a similar meeting. Inter
national conferences there have been
by the score, but never with per-
manent organization and fixed rules.
More often than not they have dealt
with isolated or specialized questions
without relation to the whole broad
basis of international affairs and with
out a central rallying point or common
Inspiration. Here, however, was a
permanent international organization
where mass of international affairs
we're sheafed together, and where dis
:ussion ranged all the way from East
ern Galicia to the Traffic in Women
and Children, from the Bolivian
"hilian dispute to the election of
Judges for the World Court, from the
prevention of opium consumption to
the presence of General Zeligowski in
Wilma. Men from every continent and
# every race and color, -Siamese, Chi
nese, Japanese, Persians, dozen diff
ferent nationalities from South Ameri-
ca, the greater part of the European
continent and all the British Domin-
ions sat side by side during four hard
weeks of work and came out not only
% know but to respect each other.
If you had been present at both the
two last Assemblies, you would have
noticed a sharp difference. In 1920,
the Assembly was an experiment; in
1921 it had become a definite organ
ization. 1t had formulated its rules
of procedure and was accepted this
year as routine business meeting Of
the nations which, for the better or
worse, had come to stay. No more
talk of its death and burial was heard
even from the most hard-headed and
sceptical Of the American correspond
ents, some of whom have come to look
on the League with somewhat the
same embarrassment as the man who
first discovered the cat with nine lives.
! It's work this year was also funda-
mentally different. The work Of the
first Assembly was to create, that Of
the second Assembly to review. The
! first Assembly had to construct and
give the initial impetus to score of
international organizations; in 1921
its task was to see if they were run
ming along in the right track and sec
ondly, if they were running with suf-
fcient rapidity. The Assembly con-
tinued this year what may we'll de-
velop into the practice of a general
debate on international questions.
During the first several sessions, it
1 based it's discussions on the general