A Revision of the Treaty / Being a Sequel to The Economic Consequence of the Peace

by John Maynard Keynes

From the Ratification of the Treaty Of Versailles to the Second Ultimatum Of London

I. The Execution of the Treaty and the Plebiscites

The Treaty of Versailles was ratified on January 10, 1920, and except in the plebiscite areas its territorial provisions came into force on that date. The Slesvig plebiscite (February and March, 1920) awarded the north to Denmark and the south to Germany, in each case by a decisive majority. The East Prussian plebiscite (July, 1920) showed an overwhelming vote for Germany. The Upper Silesian plebiscite (March, 1921) yielded a majority of nearly two to one in favor of Germany for the province as a whole,[2] but a majority for Poland in certain areas of the south and east. On the basis of this vote, and having regard to the industrial unity of certain disputed areas, the principal Allies, with the exception of France, were of opinion that, apart from the southeastern districts of Pless and Rybnik which, although they contain undeveloped coalfields of great importance, are at present agricultural in character, nearly the whole of the province should be assigned to Germany. Owing to the inability of France to accept this solution, the whole problem was referred to the League of Nations for final arbitration. This body bisected the industrial area in the interests of racial or nationalistic justice; and introduced at the same time, in the endeavor to avoid the consequences of this bisection, complicated economic provisions of doubtful efficiency in the interests of material prosperity. They limited these provisions to fifteen years, trusting perhaps that something will have occurred to revise their decision before the end of that time. Broadly speaking, the frontier has been drawn, entirely irrespective of economic considerations, so as to include as large as possible a proportion of German voters on one side of it and Polish voters on the other (although to achieve this result it has been thought necessary to assign two almost purely German towns, Kattowitz and Königshütte to Poland). From this limited point of view the work may have been done fairly. But the Treaty had directed that economic and geographical considerations should be taken into account also.

I do not intend to examine in detail the wisdom of this decision. It is believed in Germany that subterranean influence brought to bear by France contributed to the result. I doubt if this was a material factor, except that the officials of the League were naturally anxious, in the interests of the League itself, to produce a solution which would not be a fiasco through the members of the Council of the League failing to agree about it amongst themselves; which inevitably imported a certain bias in favor of a solution acceptable to France. The decision raises, I think, much more fundamental doubts about this method of settling international affairs.

Difficulties do not arise in simple cases. The League of Nations will be called in where there is a conflict between opposed and incommensurable claims. A good decision can only result by impartial, disinterested, very well–informed and authoritative persons taking everything into account. Since International Justice is dealing with vast organic units and not with a multitude of small units of which the individual particularities are best ignored and left to average themselves out, it cannot be the same thing as the cut–and–dried lawyerʼs justice of the municipal court. It will be a dangerous practice, therefore, to entrust the settlement of the ancient conflicts now inherent in the tangled structure of Europe, to elderly gentlemen from South America and the far Asiatic East, who will deem it their duty to extract a strict legal interpretation from the available signed documents,—who will, that is to say, take account of as few things as possible, in an excusable search for a simplicity which is not there. That would only give us more judgments of Solomon with the assʼs ears, a Solomon with the bandaged eyes of law, who, when he says “Divide ye the living child in twain,” means it.

The Wilsonian dogma, which exalts and dignifies the divisions of race and nationality above the bonds of trade and culture, and guarantees frontiers but not happiness, is deeply embedded in the conception of the League of Nations as at present constituted. It yields us the paradox that the first experiment in international government should exert its influence in the direction of intensifying nationalism.

These parenthetic reflections have arisen from the fact that from a certain limited point of view the Council of the League may be able to advance a good case in favor of its decision. My criticism strikes more deeply than would a mere allegation of partiality.

With the conclusion of the plebiscites the frontiers of Germany were complete.

In January 1920 Holland was called on to surrender the Kaiser; and, to the scarcely concealed relief of the Governments concerned, she duly refused (January 23, 1920). In the same month the surrender of some thousands of “war criminals” was claimed, but, in the face of a passionate protest from Germany, was not insisted on. It was arranged instead that, in the first instance at least, only a limited number of cases should be pursued, not before Allied Courts, as provided by the Treaty, but before the High Court of Leipzig. Some such cases have been tried; and now, by tacit consent, we hear no more about it.