Opinion ID: 3037822
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: be considered as a party to the treaty as

Text: amended; and (b) be considered as a party to the unamended treaty in relation to any party to the treaty not bound by the amending agreement.5 See also Saul Sorkin, Goods In Transit § 9.19 (2003) (“[I]f a State failed to become a party to the original Warsaw Convention but thereafter adhered to the Hague Protocol to the Warsaw Convention it thereby became a party to the Warsaw Convention.”); Dana L. Christensen, Comment, The Elusive Exercise of Jurisdiction Over Air Transportation Between The United States and South Korea, 10 PAC. RIM L. & POL’Y J. 653, 688-89 (2001) (“[M]ost scholars agree that . . . adherence to an amending agreement binds a new party to the terms of the original treaty with respect to parties that adhere solely to that treaty.”) [7] The authorities cited above are persuasive. We hold that the ratification of the Montreal Protocol No. 4 brought The Hague Protocol into full force and effect in the United States on March 4, 1999. 5 The Second Circuit in Avero Belgium did not apply section 5(b) because the court held that the United States, in ratifying Protocol No. 4 of Montreal, expressed an intention that this provision did not apply. We reach a contrary conclusion, holding that no such intention was expressed by Congress. 7166 CONTINENTAL INSURANCE v. FEDERAL EXPRESS We observe that President Bush’s transmittal to the Senate on July 31, 2002 of The Hague Protocol for advice and consent, S. Treaty Doc. No. 107-14, 1955 WL 45606 (2002), does not undermine this holding. The transmittal took no position on The Hague Protocol’s then-current status. It was offered to dispel future uncertainty as to whether the United States is bound by The Hague Protocol. In a June 2003 State Department white paper, offered as testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the Administration clarified that it sought to eliminate any ambiguity for the future, observing only that: If the courts were to conclude that Montreal Protocol No. 4 does not create treaty relations under The Hague Protocol, the United States’ treaty relations with the 79 countries that are parties to both the Warsaw Convention and The Hague Protocol, but not to Montreal Protocol No. 4, would be based on the Warsaw Convention, unamended by any later protocol . . . . This is an unsatisfactory result . . . . Ratification of The Hague Protocol will eliminate any ambiguity and secure for the U.S. industry The Hague Protocol’s more modern cargo documentation rules, which are critical to the efficient movement of air cargo. John R. Byerly, U.S. Aviation Policy: the Montreal Convention and The Hague Protocol, at http://www.state.gov/e/eb/ rls/rm/2003/21869.htm.