p \ a.iO’T - T>aV“prv^3.V 1 1 L reU The WINNING PLAN SELECTE3D BY THE JURY 0,?F THE AMERICAN PEACE AWARD OFFERED BY EDWARD W. BOK FOR “THE BEST PRACTICAL PLAN BY WHICH THE UNITED STATES. MAY COOPERATE WITH OTHER NATIONS TO ACHIEVE AND PRESERVE THE PEACE OF THE WORLD” IS HEREBY SUBMITTED TO THE VOTE of the AMERICAN PEOPLE Read the Plan. Consider it. Vote on the ballot inside the back cover of the book. Mail it promptly CONTENTS Page Preface i Statement of Jury of Award 3 Statement of Policy Committee 4 The Question to be Voted Upon Digest of the Plan Full Text of Plan, Number 1469 7 Ballot and Return Envelope (Enclosures) The American Peace Award PREFACE W ITH deep satisfaction I present for the consideration and vote of the American people the plan selected by the Jury as entitled to the American Peace Award under the con- ditions. The Award brought forth 22,165 plans. Since many of them were the composite work of organizations, universities, etc., a single plan often represented the views of hundreds or thousands of individuals. There were also received several hundred thousand of letters which, while they did not submit plans, sug- gested in almost every instance a solution of the peace problem. The Jury had therefore before it an index of the true feeling and judgment of hundreds of thousands of American citizens. The plans came from every group in American life. Some were obviously from life-long students of history and international law. Some were from persons who have studied little, but who have themselves seen and felt the horror of war — or who are even now living out its tragedy. However unlike, they almost all express or imply the same conviction: That this is the time for the nations of the earth to admit frankly that war is a crime and thus withdraw the legal and moral sanction too long permitted to it as a method of settling international dis- putes. Thousands of plans show a deep as- piration to have the United States take the lead in a common agreement to brand war in very truth an “outlaw.” The plans show a realization that no adequate defense against this situation has thus far been devised; and that no international law has been developed to control it. They point out that security of life and property is de- pendent upon the abolition of war and the cessation of the manufacture of munitions, Through the plans as a whole run these dominant currents: That; if war is honestly to be prevented, there must be a right-about-face on the part of I the nations in their attitude touard it: and that by some progressive agreement the manu- facture and purchase of the munitions of war must be limited or stopped. That while no political mechanism alone will insure cooperation among the nations, there must be some machinery of cooperation if the will to cooperate is to be made effective; that mutual counsel among the nations is the real hope for bringing about the disavowal of war by the open avowal of its real causes and open discussion of them. Finally, that there must be some means of defining, recording, interpreting and develop- ing the law of nations. The Jury of Award unanimously selected the plan given below as the one which most closely reflected several of these currents. The Honorable Elihu Root, chairman of the Jury of Award, then prepared the following forward-looking statement indicating that the mutual counsel and cooperation among the nations provided in the selected plan may lead to the realization of another — and not the least important — of the dominant desires of the American public as expressed in the plans; “It is the unanimous hope of the Jury that the first fruit of the mutual counsel and cooperation among the nations which will result from the adoption of the plan selected will be a general prohibition of the manufacture and sale of all materials of war." The purpose of the American Peace Award is thus fulfilled: To reflect in a practicable plan the dominating national sentiment as expressed by the large cross-section of the American public taking part in ' the Award. I therefore commend the winning plan as unanimously selected by the Jury of Award, and Mr. Root’s statement of the first object to be attained by the counsel and cooperation provided in the plan, to the interest and the widest possible vote of the American people. EDWARD W. BOK. January, 1924 Statement of Jury of Award The Jury of Award realizes that there is no one approach to w'orld peace, and that it is necessary to recognize not merely political but also psychological and economic factors. The only possible pathway to international agree- ment w'ith reference to these complicated and difficult factors is through mutual counsel and cooperation, which the plan selected contem- plates. It is therefore the unanimous opinion of the Jury that of the 22,165 plans submitted. Plan Number 1469 is “the best practicable plan by which the United States may cooperate with other nations to achieve and preserve the peace of the world.” It is the unanimous hope of the Jury that the first fruit of the mutual counsel and cooperation among the nations which will result from the adoption of the plan selected will be a general prohibition of the manufacture and sale of all materials of war. Elihu Root, Chairman James Guthrie Harbord Edward M. House Ellen Fitz Pendleton Roscoe Pound William Allen White Brand Whitlock 3 Statement of Policy Committee THE QUESTION TO BE VOTED UPON The substantial provisions which constitute plan Number 1469. selected by the Jury of Award, and upon which the vote of the Ameri- can people is asked, are hereby submitted as follows; I. ENTER THE PERMANENT COURT That the United States adhere to the Permanent Court of International Justice for the reasons and under the conditions stated by Secretary Hughes and President Harding in February. 1923. II. COOPERATE WITH THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS WITHOUT FULL MEMBERSHIP AT PRESENT That, without becoming a member of the League of Nations as at present con- stituted, the United States Government should extend its present cooperation with the League and propose participation in the work of its Assembly and Council under the following conditions and reserva- tions : Safeguarding of Monroe Doctrine 1 . The United States accepts the League of Nations as an instrument of mutual counsel, but it will assume no obligation to interfere with political questions of policy or internal administration of any foreign state. In uniting its efforts with those of other States for the preservation of peace and the promotion of the common welfare, the United States insists upon the safeguard- ing of the Monroe Doctrine and does not abandon its traditional attitude concern- ing American independence of the Old World and does not consent to submit its long-established policy concerning ques- tions regarded by it as purely American to the recommendation or decision of other Powers. 4 No Military or Economic Force 2. That the only kind of compulsion which nations can freely engage to apply to each other in the name of Peace is that which arises from conference, from moral judgment, from full publicity, and from the power of public opinion. The United States will assume no obligations under Article X in its present form, or under Article XVI in its present form in the Covenant, or in its amended form as now proposed unless in any par- ticular case Congress has authorized such action. The United States proposes that Arti- cles X and XVI be either dropped alto- gether or so amended and changed as to eliminate any suggestion of a general agreement to use coercion for obtaining conformity to the pledges of the Covenant. No Obligations Under Versailles Treaty 3. That the United States will accept no responsibilities under the Treaty of Ver- sailles unless in any particular case Con- gress has authorized such action. League Open to All Nations 4. The United States Government pro- poses that Article I of the Covenant be construed and applied, or, if necessary, redrafted, so that admission to the Leagu shall be assured to any self-governing State that wishes to join and that receives the favorable vote of two-thirds of the Assembly. Devebpment of International Law 5. As a condition of its participation in the work and counsels of the League, the United States asks that the Assembly and Council consent — or obtain authority — to begin collaboration for the revision and development of international law, employ- ing for this purpose the aid of a commission of jurists. This Commission would be directed to formulate anew existing rules of the law of nations, to reconcile divergent opinions, to consider points hitherto in- adequately provided for but vital to the maintenance of international justice, and 5 in general to define the social tights and duties of States. The recommendations of the Commission would be presented from time to time, in proper form for consideration, to the Assembly as to a recommending if not a lawmaking body. The program set forth above is hereby re- ferred to the vote of the American people. A ballot upon which voters may state whether or not they approve the plan in substance will be found inside the back cover. Author’s Name Not to Be Revealed Until After Referendum In order that the vote may be taken solely upon the merits of the plan, the Policy Committee, with the acquiescence of Mr. Bok, has decided not to disclose the authorship of the plan until after the referendum, or early in February. The identity of the author is unknown to the members of the Jury of Award and the Policy Committee, except one delegated member. The Policy Committee John W. Davis Learned Hand William H. Johnston Esther Everett Lape Member in Charge Nathan L. Miller Mrs. Gifford Pinchot Mrs. Ogden Reid Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt Henry L. Stimson Melville E. Stone Mrs. Frank A. Vanderlip Cornelius N. Bliss, Jr., Treasurer 6 Full Text of Plan The complete manuscript of the author of the plan. No. 1469, including his reasoning, is given below; A plan to secure cooperation be- tween the United States and other nations “to achieve and preserve the peace of the world” Five-sixths of all nations, including about four-fifths of mankind, have already created a world organization, the purpose of which is “to promote international cooperation and to achieve international peace and security.” There Is Not Room for More Than One Organization to Promote International Cooperation Those nations cannot and will not abandon this system, which has now been actively op- erating for three and a half years. If leading members of the United States Government ever had serious hopes that another association of nations could be formed, such hopes were dispelled during the Washington Conference by plain intimations from other Powers that there is not room for more than one organization like the League of Nations. The States outside the organized world are not of such a character that the United States could hopefully cooperate with them for the purpose named. Therefore, the only possible path to co- operation in which the United States can take an increasing share is that which leads toward some form of agreement with the world as now organized, called the League of Nations. By sheer force of social international gravi- tation such cooperation becomes inevitable. The United States Has Already Gone Far in Cooperation With the League of Nations The United States Government, theoretically maintaining a policy of isolation, has actually gone far, since March 4, 1921, toward “co- operation with other nations to achieve and preserve the peace of the world.” 7 The most familiar part of the story is the work of the Washington Conference, wherein President Harding’s Administration made a beginning of naval disarmament, opened to China a prospect of rehabilitation and joined with Great Britain, Japan and France to make the Pacific Ocean worthy of its name. Later came the recommendation that the United States should adhere to the Permanent Court of International Justice. Not long after that action President Harding wrote to Bishop Gailor; “I do not believe any man can confront the responsibility of a President of the United States and yet adhere to the idea that it is possible for our country to maintain an attitude of isolation and aloofness in the world." But since the proposed adhesion to the Per- manent Court would bring this country into close contact at one time and point with the League of Nations, and since such action is strenuously opposed for exactly that reason, it is pertinent to inquire not only how much cooperation with the League and its organs has been proposed during the life of the present Administration, but also how much has been actually begun. Officially or Unofficially the United States Is Represented on Many League Commissions The United States Government has accred- ited its representatives to sit as members “in an unofficial and consulting capacity” upon four of the most important social welfare com- missions of the League, viz. : Health, Opium, Traffic in Women and Children, and Anthrax (Industrial Hygiene). Our Government is a full member of the International Hydrographic Bureau, an organ of the League. Our Government was repre- sented by an “unofficial” observer in the Brussels Conference (Finance and Economic Commission) in 1920. It sent Hon. Stephen G. Porter and Bishop Brent to represent it at the meeting of the Opium Commission last May. Our Public Health Service has taken part in the Serological Congresses of the Epidemics Commission and has helped in the experimental work for the standardization of serums. 8 Our Government collaborates with the League Health Organization through the In- ternational Office of Public Health at Paris, and with the Agriculture Committee of the League Labor Organization through the Inter- national Institute of Agriculture at Rome. In February, 1923, Secretary Hughes and President Harding formally recommended that the Senate approve our adhesion to the Per- manent Court under four conditions or reser- vations, one of which was that the United States should officially participate in the election of judges by the Assembly and Council of the League, sitting as electoral colleges for that purpose. Unofficial cooperation from the United States with the work of the League includes member- ship in five of the social welfare commissions or committees of the League, in one on eco- nomic reconstruction, and in one (Aaland Islands) which averted a war. American women serve as expert Assessors upon the Opium and Traffic in Women Commissions. Two philanthropic agencies in the United States have between them pledged more than $400,000 to support either the work of the Epidemics Commission or the League inquiry into conditions of the traffic in women and children. How Can Increasing Cooperation Between the United States and the Organized World Be Secured? The United States being already so far committed to united counsels with League agencies for the common social welfare, all of which have some bearing upon the preserva- tion of world peace, the question before us may take this form : How can increasing cooperation between the United States and the organized world for the promotion of peace and security be assured, in forms acceptable to the people of the United States and hopefully practicable? The United States Can Extend Its Present Cooperation With the League’s Social Welfare Activities Without any change in its present policy, already described, the United States Govern- ment could, first, show its willingness to co- operate similarly with the other humane and 9 reconstructive agencies of the League. To four of these agencies that Government has already sent delegates with advisory powers. It could as properly accept invitations to accredit members with like powers to each one of the other welfare commissions. It has already received invitations from two of the latter. It is, secondly, immediately practicable to ex- tend the same kind of cooperation, whenever asked to do it, so as to include participation in the work of the commissions and technical com- mittees of the Labor Organization. The record shows that such -cooperation is already begun. The single common purpose of all these committees is the collection and study of information, on which may be based subse- quent recommendations for national legislation. All conventions and resolutions, recom- mended by the first three congresses of the International Labor Organization, have already been laid before the Senaie of the United States and, without objection, referred to the appro- priate committee. No different procedure would have been followed if the United States were a member of the Labor Organization of the League. An Immediate Step Is Adherence to the Permanent Court An immediately practicable step is, thirdly, the Senate’s approval of the proposal that the United States adh@re to the Permanent Court of International Justice for the reasons and under the conditions stated by Secretary Hughes and President Harding in February, 1923. These three suggestions for increasing cooperation with the family of nations are in harmony with policies already adopted by our Government, and in the last case with a policy so old and well recognized that it may now be called traditional. They do not involve a question of member- ship in the League of Nations as now con- stituted, but it cannot be denied that they lead to the threshold of that question. Any further step toward cooperation must confront the problem of direct relations between the United States and the Assembly and Council of fifty-four nations in the League.* *Fifty-seven States, including Germany, are members of the International Labor Organization of the League. There are aboutj^sixty-five independent States in the world. lO In Actual Operation the League Employs No Force The practical experience of the League during its first three and a half years of life has not only wrought out, in a group of precedents, the beginnings of what might be called the constitutional law of the League, but it has also shifted the emphasis in activi- ties of the League and foreshadowed important modifications in its constitution, the Covenant. At its birth the Covenant of the League bore, vaguely in Article X and more clearly in Article XVI, the impression of a general agreement to enforce and coerce. Both of those Articles suggest the action of a world state which never existed and does not now exist. How far the present League is actually removed from functioning as such a State is sufficiently exhibited in its dealings with Lithuania and Poland over Vilna and their common boundary, and with Greece and Italy over Corfu. Experience in the last three years has demonstrated probably insuperable difficulties ' in the way of fulfilling in ail parts of the world I the large promise of Article X in respect to : either its letter or its spirit. No one now ! expects the League Council to try to summon armies and fleets, since it utterly failed to obtain even an international police force for the Vilna district. Each Assembly of the League has witnessed vigorous efforts to interpret and modify Article X. In the Fourth Assembly an at- tempt to adopt an interpretation of that Article in essential agreement with the Sena- torial reservation on the same, subject in 1920 was blocked only by a small group of we-ak States like Persia and Panama, which evi- dently attributed to Article X a protective power that it possesses only on paper. Such States, in possible fear of unfriendly neighbors, must decide whether the preserva- tion of a form of words in the Covenant is more vital to their peace and security, and to the peace and security of the world, than the presence of the United States at the council table of the family of nations. As to Article XV I, the Council of the League created a Blockade Commission which worked for two years to determine how the 1 1 “economic weapon” of the League could be efficiently used and uniformly applied. The Q)mmission failed to discover any obligatory procedure that weaker Powers would dare to accept. It was finally agreed that each State must decide for itself whether a breach of the Covenant has been committed. The Second Assembly adopted a radically amended form of Article XVI from which was removed all reference to the possibility of employing military force, and in which the abandonment of uniform obligation was directly provided for. The British Govern- ment has since proposed to weaken the form of requirement still further. Articles X and XVI, in their original forms, have therefore been practically condemned by the principal organs of the League and are today reduced to something like innocuous desuetude. The only kind of compulsion which nations can freely engage to apply to each other in the name of Peace is that which arises from conference, from moral judgment, from full publicity, and from the power of public opinion. The Leadership of the United States in the New World is Obviously Recognized by the League Another significant development in the constitutional practice of the League is the unwillingness of the League Council to inter- vene in any American controversy, even though all States in the New World except three are members of the League. This refusal became evident in the Panama- Costa Rica dispute in 1921 and in the quarrel between Chile, Peru, and Bolivia, a quarrel which impelled the last two States to absent themselves from the Third Assembly, wherein a Chilean was chosen to preside. Obviously the League intends to recognize the leadership of the United States in the New World precisely as the United States claims it. This is nothing less than the observance of an unwritten law limiting the powers and duties of the League Council, defined in Article XI of the Covenant, to questions that seem to threaten the peace of the Old World. When the United States is willing to bring the two halves of the world together for friendly con- sideration of common dangers, duties and needs, it will be possible to secure, if it is desired, closer cooperation between the League organizations and the Pan American Lfnion, already a potential regional league. It is con- ceivable that the family of nations may eventually clearly define certain powers and duties of relatively local significance which may be devolved upon local ■ associations or unions. But the world of business and finance is already unified. The worlds of scientific knowledge and humane effort are nearly so. Isolation of any kind is increasingly impossible, and world organization, already centralized, is no more likely to return to disconnected effort than the United States is likely to revert to the Calhoun theory of States’ Rights and Seces- sion. In Actual Operation, if Not in Original Conception, the League Realizes the Principle and the Hopes of the Hague Conferences The operation of the League has therefore evolved a Council widely different from the body imagined by the makers of the Covenant. It can employ no force but that of persuasion and moral influence. Its only actual powers are to confer and advise, to create commissions, to exercise inquisitive, conciliative and arbitral functions, and to help elect judges of the Permanent Court. In other words the force of circumstances is gradually moving the League into position upon the foundations so well laid by the world’s leaders between 1899 and 1907 in the great international councils of that period. The Assemblies of the League and the Con- gresses of the International Labor Organiza- tions are successors to the Hague Conferences. The Permanent Court has at least begun to realize the highest hope and purpose of the Second Hague Conference. The Secretariat and the Labor Office have Decome Continuation Committees for the administrative work of the organized world, such as the Hague Conferences lacked resources to create but would have rejoiced to see. The Council, resolving loose and large theories into clean-cut and modest practice, has been gradually reconciling the League, as an organized world, with the ideals of interna- tional interdependence, temporarily obscured 13 since 1914 by the shadows of the Great War. No one can deny that the organs of the League have brought to the service of the forces behind those ideals an efficiency, scope and variety of appeal that in 1914 would have seemed incredible. It is common knowledge that public opinion and official policy in the United States have for a long time, without distinction of party, been favorable to international conferences for the common welfare, and to the establishment of conciliative, arbitral and judicial means for settling international disputes. There is no reason to believe that the judg- ment and policy have been changed. Along these same lines the League is now plainly crystallizing, as has been shown, and at the touch of the United States the process can be expedited. In no other way can the organized world, from which the United States cannot be economically and spiritually separated, belt the power of public opinion to the new ma- chinery, devised for the pacific settlement of controversies between nations and standing always ready for use. The United States Should Participate in the League’s Work Under Stated Conditions The United States Government should be authorized to propose cooperation with the League and participation in the work of its Assembly and Council under the following conditions and reservations. 1. The United States accepts the League of Nations as an instrument of mutual counsel, but it will assume no obligation to interfere with political questions of policy or internal administration of any foreign State. The United States Will Maintain the Monroe Do<;trine In uniting its efforts with those of other States for the preservation of peace and the promotion of the common welfare, the United States does not abandon its traditional attitude concerning American independence of the Old World and does not consent to submit its long- established policy concerning questions re- garded by it as purely American to the recom- mendation or decision of other Powers. 14 The United States Proposes That Moral Judgment and Public Opinion be Substituted for Force II. The United States will assume no obli- gations under Article X. in its present form in the Covenant, unless in any particular case Congress has authorized such action. The United States will assume no obli- gations under Article XVI, in its present form in the Covenant or in its amended form as now proposed, unless in any particular case Congress has authorized such action. The United States proposes that Articles X and XVI be either dropped altogether or so amended and changed as to eliminate any suggestion of a general agreement to use coercion for obtaining conformity to the pledges of the Covenant. The United States Will Assume No Obligations Under the Versailles Treaty III. The United States Government will accept no responsibility and assume no obliga- tion in connection "with any duties imposed upon the League by the peace treaties, unless in any particular case Congress has authorized such action. The United States Proposes that Admission Be Assured to Any Self-Governing State IV. The United States Government pro- poses that Article I of the Covenant be con- strued and applied, or, if necessary, redrafted, so that admission to the League shall be assured to any self-governing State that wishes to join and that receives the favorable vote of two-thirds of the Assembly. The Continuing Development of Inter- national Law Must be Provided For V. As a further condition ©f its participation in the work and counsels of the League, the United States asks that the Assembly and Council consent — or obtain authority — to be- gin collaboration for the revision and develop- ment of international law, employing, for this purpose, the aid of a commission of jurists. This commission would be directed 15 to formulate anew existing rules of the law of nations, to reconcile divergent opinions, to consider points hitherto inadequately provided for but vital to the maintenance of international justice, and in general to define the social rights and duties of States. The recommen- dations of the commission would be presented from time to time, in proper form for considera- tion, to the Assembly as to a recommending if not a lawmaking body. Among these conditions Numbers I and II have already been discussed. Number III is a logical consequence of the refusal of the United States Senate to ratify the treaty of Versailles, and of the settled policy of the United States which is characterized in the first reservation. Concerning Numbers IV and V this may be said; Anything less than a world conference, especially when Great Powers are excluded, must incur, in proportion to the exclusions, the suspicion of being an alliance, rather than a family of nations. The United States can render service in emphasizing this lesson, learned in the Hague Conferences, and in thus helping to reconstitute the family of nations as it really is. Such a conference or assembly must obviously bear the chief responsibility for the development of new parts of the law of nations, devised to fit changed and changing conditions, to extend the sway of justice, and to help in preserving peace and security. i6 THE AMERICAN PEACE AWARD 342 Madison Avenue, New York City POLICY COMMITTEE JOHN W. DAVIS LEARNED HAND WILLIAM H. JOHNSTON ESTHER EVERETT LAPE Member in Charge NATHAN L. MILLER MRS. GIFFORD PINCHOT MRS. OGDEN REID MRS. FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT HENRY L. STIMSON MELVILLE STONE MRS. FRANK A. VANDERLIP CORNELIUS N. BLISS, Jr., Treasurer JURY OF AWARD ELIHU ROOT, Chairman JAMES GUTHRIE HARBORD EDWARD M. HOUSE ELLEN F. PENDLETON ROSCOE POUND WILLIAM ALLEN WHITE BRAND WHITLOCK WYNKOO» HALLENBECK CRAWFORD CCMf ANY. NEW YORK f ■ \ yi i-' --^‘ A-*' ‘