Progress of the Work of the League of Nations Codification Committee

1927 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 659-667
Author(s):  
Jesse S. Reeves

With the adoption of a resolution by the Council of the League of Nations, transmitting the report of the Committee of Experts for the Progressive Codification of International Law to the Assembly, what may be called the preliminary work of that Committee has reached such a stage that it seems possible to review its activities in the process of codification adopted by the League of Nations. It will be remembered that the Hague Commission of Jurists in its report accompanying the Statute of the World Court recommended the creation of agencies for codification, and that Lord Robert Cecil’s opposition to codification delayed acceptance of the Commission’s recommendation until September, 1924, when the Assembly upon the initiative of Sweden provided for the appointment of a committee of experts.

1951 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 648-670 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kurt Wilk

If, after the nineteenth century, there remained any question concerning the universality of international law, or of its fundamental rules, it appeared to be largely one of legal history. But as the world of the twentieth century has come to be divided by political ideologies, their legal ramifications have given the question new actuality as one of basic legal theory. That the Family of Nations, or the subjects of international law, embraced virtually all states of the world seemed no longer open to serious doubt when non-Christian states wholly outside Europe took part in the Hague Peace Conferences of 1899 and 1907 and when participation by such states was continued and further extended in the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and in the League of Nations. Yet the same period that saw the unquestioned global expansion of international law has had to face new challenges to its unity as a single, universally valid legal system. They were raised chiefly by German Nazis and Soviet Communists, or in turn against them by their respective critics and opponents. Confronted with these challenges, the universal validity of international law appears no longer as an existingphenomenon that may be traced back to its origins and on to its eventual completion, but as a debatable assumption that stands to be justified or rejected in the light of fresh examination.


1930 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 674-693 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hunter Miller

The Conference for the Codification of International Law which met at The Hague from March 13 to April 12, 1930, was the first international conference specifically called for that purpose.In 1924 the League of Nations set up a Committee of Experts for the progressive codification of international law. The task of that committee was to select and propose for the first conference on codification a certain number of subjects within the field of international law. Three subjects, namely, Nationality, Territorial Waters and The Responsibility of States for Damage Caused in Their Territory to the Person or Property of Foreigners, were finally agreed on as the subjects to be considered by the first conference.


Author(s):  
Rodríguez José Antonio Moreno

This chapter highlights Paraguayan perspectives on the Hague Principles. Paraguay does not have a law dealing comprehensively and organically with Private International Law. The Civil and Commercial Code of 1987 contains the basic regulation on conflict of laws, and other provisions on the field can be found scattered in several special laws dealing with specific matters. Paraguay adhered, as a Member State, to the Hague Conference on Private International Law via Law 2555 of 2005. It is the first country in the world to legislate on international contracts heavily influenced by the Hague Principles. The Paraguayan law on international contracts drawn upon the Hague Principles openly allows the application of non-State law, and the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) Principles clearly qualify as such.


Author(s):  
V.C. Govindaraj

The world has to acknowledge the contribution the Hague Conference on Private International Law has hitherto made and continues to make in its endeavour to obtain from the world community approval and acceptance of the outcome of its efforts to unify rules of conflict of laws. India has become an active member of the Hague Conference. This chapter discusses the recognition of decrees of divorces and judicial separation and maintenance obligations; child custody and child abduction; the law relating to succession; the law relating to service of summons abroad; Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents, 1961; and Hague Convention on Taking of Evidence Abroad in Civil or Commercial Matters, 1970.


Author(s):  
Vitit Muntarbhorn

This chapter focuses on international law in Thailand. Siam was one of the original states from the Asian region that took part in the formation of the international legal system, notably the Hague Conference in 1899, which resulted in various treaties on the law of war, followed by the 1907 Hague Conference that resulted in a host of treaties on rules and regulations concerning the conduct of war. It was a member of the League of Nations and contributed to key international developments, such as the evolution of treaties against human trafficking. In the diplomatic juggle to set up the United Nations after the Second World War, Thailand sought membership, played its hand diplomatically, and gained admission. It was also one of the founders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 1967, and it was one of the key players that brought peace to Cambodia and the region in the 1990s.


Sovereignty ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 168-172
Author(s):  
Hermann Heller

This chapter considers the attempt of contemporary international law doctrine to minimize the concept of sovereignty. The attempt is made to draw its fangs by construing the nature of sovereignty as a kind of modest, legally normed capacity to act, as authority under international law, or as a discretionary sphere granted by international law. However, this operation can never succeed using the tools of international law, because international law is only possible as long as there are at least two absolutely independent territorial decision-making units. The sovereignty problem has become more complicated for members of the League of Nations and its Permanent International Court in The Hague. The principles of a treaty order free of domination on which these institutions rest have not fundamentally changed; voluntariness and unanimity are preserved under these principles.


2016 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 391-408
Author(s):  
Yuval Shany

The events surrounding the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and the ensuing Palestinian naqba (disaster) have generated an abundance of legal literature. It is beyond the ambitions of this article to revisit all or most of the existing literature, or to strive and comprehensively discuss the various legal propositions they consider. Instead, it offers a critical assessment of some of the legal conclusions offered by one of the most influential experts in the field – Professor James Crawford – who, in the second edition of his seminal treatise The Creation of States in International Law, discusses at some length the events surrounding the creation of Israel and the status of Palestine. Section 2 of the article offers some general observations on the continued relevance of the events surrounding the creation of Israel. In particular, it raises the question of the relationship between the principles of ex injuria non oritur jus and ex factis oritur jus in the Israeli–Palestinian context. Section 3 examines the legal significance of the 1922 League of Nations Mandate and Crawford's position concerning its validity. Sections 4 and 5 adopt a similar examination with regard to two other historic events of potential legal significance, namely the 1947 UN General Assembly Resolution 181 (the Partition Resolution) and Israel's 1948 Declaration of Independence. Section 5 also briefly examines Crawford's conclusions relating to the status of Palestine, and Section 6 concludes.


1928 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-160
Author(s):  
Arnold D. McNair

The method adopted at the end of the World War for dealing with the colonies and territories of Germany and Turkey which it was decided to detach from them is known as the mandate system, and is embodied in Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, which is an integral part of the treaties of peace with Germany, Austria, Bulgaria and Hungary. Under this system these detached territories are not in the owner-ship of any State, but are entrusted to certain States called ‘Mandatory States’ to administer on behalf of the League upon the conditions laid down in written agreements called mandates between the League and each mandatory. The system, which was proposed by General Smuts, is a novelty in International Law, and although the term ‘mandate’ suggests certain analogies in private law, it is doubtful whether much practical help in the understanding and application of the system can be derived from these sources.


2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 210-232 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Wertheim

AbstractDuring the First World War, civil society groups across the North Atlantic put forward an array of plans for recasting international society. The most prominent ones sought to build on the Hague Conferences of 1899 and 1907 by developing international legal codes and, in a drastic innovation, obligating and militarily enforcing the judicial settlement of disputes. Their ideal was a world governed by law, which they opposed to politics. This idea was championed by the largest groups in the United States and France in favour of international organizations, and they had likeminded counterparts in Britain. The Anglo-American architects of the League of Nations, however, defined their vision against legalism. Their declaratory design sought to ensure that artificial machinery never stifled the growth of common consciousness. Paradoxically, the bold new experiment in international organization was forged from an anti-formalistic ethos – one that slowed the momentum of international law and portended the rise of global governance.


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