The International Prize Court.
§ 476a. The International Prize Court will be established at the Hague according to Convention XII. of the second Hague Peace Conference of 1907. The following are the more important stipulations of this Convention concerning the constitution[828] of the Court:—The Court consists of fifteen judges and fifteen deputy-judges, who are appointed for a period of six years and who rank equally and have precedence according to the date of the notification of their appointment, but the deputy judges rank after the judges (articles 10 to 12). Of the fifteen judges of which the Court is composed, nine constitute a quorum; a judge who is absent or prevented from sitting is replaced by his deputy judge (article 14). The judges enjoy diplomatic privileges and immunities in the performance of their duties when outside their own country (article 13). Each contracting Power appoints one judge and one deputy judge, and the judges appointed by Great Britain, Germany, the United States of America, Austria-Hungary, France, Italy, Japan, and Russia are always summoned to sit, whereas the judges appointed by the other contracting Powers sit by rota, as shown in the table annexed to the Convention (article 15). If a belligerent Power has, according to the rota, no judge sitting in the Court, it may ask that the judge appointed by it shall take part in the settlement of all cases arising from the war; lots shall then be drawn as to which of the judges entitled to sit according to the rota shall withdraw, and this arrangement does not affect the judge appointed by the other belligerent (article 16). No judge can sit who has been a party, in any way whatever, to the sentence pronounced by the National Courts, or has taken part in the case as counsel or advocate for one of the parties; no judge or deputy judge can, during his tenure of office, appear as agent or advocate before the International Prize Court, nor act for one of the parties in any capacity whatever (article 17). The belligerent captor is entitled to appoint a naval officer of high rank to sit as assessor, but with no voice in the decision; a neutral Power, which is a party to the proceedings or whose national is a party, has the same right of appointment; if in applying this last provision more than one Power is concerned, they must agree among themselves, if necessary by lot, on the officer to be appointed (article 18). The Court elects its President and Vice-President by an absolute majority of the votes cast; after two ballots, the election is made by a bare majority, and, in case the votes are equal, by lot (article 19). The judges of the International Prize Court are entitled to travelling allowances in accordance with the regulations in force in their own country, and in addition thereto receive, while the Court is sitting or while they are carrying out duties conferred upon them by the Court, a sum of 100 Netherland florins per diem; the judges may not receive from their own Governments or from that of any other Power any remuneration in their capacity of members of the Court (article 20). The seat of the International Prize Court is at the Hague, and it cannot, except in the case of force majeure, be transferred elsewhere without the consent of the belligerents (article 21).
[828] Details concerning the constitution of the International Prize Court and the mode of procedure to be followed by and before it, will be given below, [vol. II. part III. chapter VI].
The proposed International Court of Justice.
§ 476b. Valuable as is the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague, it must be pointed out that it is not a real Court of Justice. For, firstly, it is not itself a deciding tribunal, but only a list of names out of which the parties in each case elect some members and thereby constitute the Court. Secondly, experience teaches that a Court of Arbitration endeavours more to give an award ex aequo et bono which more or less pleases both parties than to decide the conflict in a judicial manner by simply applying strict legal rules without any consideration as to whether or no the decision will please either party. Thirdly, since in conflicts to be decided by arbitration the arbitrators each time are selected by the parties, there are in most cases different individuals acting as arbitrators, so that there is no continuity in the administration of justice.
For these reasons it would be of the greatest value to institute side by side with the Permanent Court of Arbitration a real International Court of Justice consisting of a number of judges in the technical sense of the term, who are once for all appointed and will have to act in each case that the parties choose to bring before the Court. Such a Court would only take the legal aspects of the case into consideration and would base its decision on mere legal deliberations. It would secure continuity in the administration of international justice, because it would in each case consider itself bound by its former decisions. It would in time build up a valuable practice by deciding innumerable controversies which as yet haunt the theory of International Law. The second Hague Peace Conference of 1907 therefore discussed the question of creating such a Court, but only produced the draft of a Convention concerning the subject. It is, however, to be regretted that this draft Convention speaks of the creation of a judicial "Arbitration" Court, and thereby obliterates the boundary line between the arbitral and the strictly judicial decision of international disputes; it would have been better to speak simply of an International Court of Justice. However that may be, there is no doubt that the near future will bring the establishment of such a Court of Justice in contradistinction to the Permanent Court of Arbitration, for the parties to a conflict frequently hesitate to have it settled by arbitration, whereas they would be glad to have it settled by a strictly judicial decision of the legal questions involved. The same motives which urged the Powers to leave aside the Permanent Court of Arbitration in Prize Cases and to enter into a Convention for the establishment of a real International Prize Court, will in time compel the Powers to establish a real International Court of Justice.[829]
[829] It should be mentioned that Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and San Salvador in 1907—see Supplement to the American Journal of International Law, II. (1908), p. 231—established the "Central American Court of Justice" at Cartago, consisting of five judges, to which they have bound themselves to submit all controversies arising amongst them, of whatsoever nature, no matter what the origin may be, in case they cannot be settled by diplomatic negotiation. This Court is, however, only of local importance, although it is of great value, being the first Court of its kind.