APPENDIX D.—SOME PRINCIPLES OF INTERNATIONAL LAW.
Nature and Origin.—A savage meeting in the forest a person whom he has never seen before is apt to look upon him as a foe. As civilization increases, danger to one's personal rights decreases, and stranger ceases to mean enemy. It has gradually come about that the confidence and courtesy shown to one another by men in their individual relations have extended to the relations of states. Morality, reason, and custom have established among the nations certain rules of conduct with respect to one another. The rules constitute what is called international law.
As might be guessed, international law is a matter of comparatively recent origin, and exists only among the most highly civilized nations. Not being the enactment of any general legislative body, having no courts competent to pass upon it nor executive to enforce its provisions, this law must be framed by agreement, and its carrying out must rest upon national good faith.
PEACE RELATIONS.
The great purpose of international law being to preserve peace by removing the causes of war, we shall first consider some of the arrangements operative in times of peace.
Non-interference.—Among individuals it is found that, as a rule, it is best for each person to mind his own business. Similarly, among nations non-interference by one with the internal affairs of another is a cardinal principle. It is, therefore, a general rule that a people may adopt such form of government as they choose, and that whenever they wish they may amend or entirely alter it. [Footnote: A change in the form of government does not release the nation from prior obligations.] And the government formed has a right to operate without dictation from other powers. Nor has any foreign nation a right to inquire how the government has come into being; sufficient that it is the government.
This right of a nation to manage its own affairs is called sovereignty.
It belongs to a small independent nation as completely as to a large one.
The act of one government in acknowledging the validity and sovereignty of
another is called recognizing it. (See page 349, last paragraph.)
It is sometimes a delicate question to determine whether to recognize a community as a nation or not. Thus, if a dependency is seeking to become independent, our personal sympathies are naturally with it, and yet it might be contrary to the law of nations, an "unfriendly act" to the sovereign power, for our government to recognize its independence. During the struggle of the Spanish-American colonies for separate political existence, John Quincy Adams, then (1822) secretary of state, formulated the proper rule of action thus: "In every question relating to the independence of a nation two principles are involved, one of right and the other of fact, the former exclusively depending upon the determination of the nation itself, and the latter resulting from the successful execution of that determination … The government of the United States yielded to an obligation of duty of the highest order by recognizing as independent states nations which, after deliberately asserting their right to that character, have maintained and established it against all the resistance which had been or could be brought to oppose it. This recognition is … the mere acknowledgment of existing facts." [Footnote: Wharton's International Law Digest, Volume I., page 162.]
Although sovereignty implies the right of a government to enter freely into such relations with any other nation as may be mutually agreeable, the nations of Europe feel at liberty in self-defense to interfere with any arrangements that threaten the "balance of power." Thus France would feel justified in opposing a very close alliance between Prussia and Spain.
It is our good fortune not to have any dangerous neighbors. We are reasonably sure of peace so long as we act in accordance with the counsel of Washington, "Friendly relations with all, entangling alliances with none."