Hall, § 121—Lawrence, § 138—Westlake, II. pp. 11-18—Taylor, § 444—Moore, VII. § 1097—Bluntschli, §§ 506-507—Heffter, § 112—Bulmerincq in Holtzendorff, IV. pp. 116-127—Ullmann, § 162—Bonfils, Nos. 986-994—Despagnet, Nos. 496-498—Pradier-Fodéré, V. Nos. 2483-2489, VI. No. 2648—Rivier, II. § 60—Nys, III. pp. 91-94—Calvo, III. §§ 1832-1859—Fiore, II. No. 1231, and Code, Nos. 1404-1414—Martens, II. 105—Holland, Studies, pp. 151-167—Deane, The Law of Blockade (1870), pp. 45-48—Fauchille, Du blocus maritime (1882), pp. 37-67—Falcke, Die Hauptperioden der sogenannten Friedensblockade (1891), and in the Zeitschrift für Internationales Recht, XIX. (1909), pp. 63-175—Barès, Le blocus pacifique (1898)—Ducrocq, Représailles en temps de paix (1901), pp. 58-174—Hogan, Pacific Blockade (1908)—Söderquist, Le Blocus Maritime (1908)—Staudacher, Die Friedensblockade (1909)—Westlake in The Law Quarterly Review, XXV. (1909), pp. 13-23.
Development of practice of Pacific Blockade.
§ 44. Before the nineteenth century blockade was only known as a measure between belligerents in time of war. It was not until the second quarter of the nineteenth century that the first case occurred of a so-called pacific blockade—that is, a blockade during time of peace—as a compulsive means of settling international differences; and all such cases are either cases of intervention or of reprisals.[46] The first case, one of intervention, happened in 1827, when, during the Greek insurrection, Great Britain, France, and Russia intervened in the interest of the independence of Greece and blockaded those parts of the Greek coast which were occupied by Turkish troops. Although this blockade led to the battle of Navarino, in which the Turkish fleet was destroyed, the Powers maintained, nevertheless, that they were not at war with Turkey. In 1831, France blockaded the Tagus as an act of reprisal for the purpose of exacting redress from Portugal for injuries sustained by French subjects. Great Britain and France, exercising intervention for the purpose of making Holland consent to the independence of revolting Belgium, blockaded in 1833 the coast of Holland. In 1838, France blockaded the ports of Mexico as an act of reprisal, but Mexico declared war against France in answer to this pacific blockade. Likewise as an act of reprisal, and in the same year, France blockaded the ports of Argentina; and in 1845, conjointly with Great Britain, France blockaded the ports of Argentina a second time. In 1850, in the course of her differences with Greece on account of the case of Don Pacifico,[47] Great Britain blockaded the Greek ports, but for Greek vessels only. Another case of intervention was the pacific blockade instituted in 1860 by Sardinia, in aid of an insurrection against the then Sicilian ports of Messina and Gaeta, but the following year saw the conversion of the pacific blockade into a war blockade. In 1862 Great Britain by way of reprisal for the plundering of a wrecked British merchantman, blockaded the Brazilian port of Rio de Janeiro. The blockade of the island of Formosa by France during her differences with China in 1884 and that of the port of Menam by France during her differences with Siam in 1893 are likewise cases of reprisals. On the other hand, cases of intervention are the blockade of the Greek coast in 1886 by Great Britain, Austria-Hungary, Germany, Italy, and Russia, for the purpose of preventing Greece from making war against Turkey; and further, the blockade of the island of Crete in 1897 by the united Powers. The last case occurred in 1902, when Great Britain, Germany, and Italy blockaded, by way of reprisal, the coast of Venezuela.[48]
[46] A blockade instituted by a State against such portions of its own territory as are in revolt is not a blockade for the purpose of settling international differences. It has, therefore, in itself nothing to do with the Law of Nations, but is a matter of internal police. I cannot, therefore, agree with Holland, who, in his Studies in International Law, p. 138, treats it as a pacific blockade sensu generali. Of course, necessity of self-preservation only can justify a State that has blockaded one of its own ports in preventing the egress and ingress of foreign vessels. And the question might arise whether compensation ought not to be paid for losses sustained by foreign vessels so detained.
[48] This blockade, although ostensibly a war blockade for the purpose of preventing the ingress of foreign vessels, was nevertheless essentially a pacific blockade. See Holland, in The Law Quarterly Review, XIX. (1903), p. 133; Parliamentary Papers, Venezuela, No. 1 (Venezuela), Correspondence respecting the Affairs of Venezuela.
Admissibility of Pacific Blockade.
§ 45. No unanimity exists among international lawyers with regard to the question whether or not pacific blockades are admissible according to the principles of the Law of Nations. There is no doubt that the theory of the Law of Nations forbids the seizure and sequestration of vessels other than those of the blockaded State caught in an attempt to break a pacific blockade. For even those writers who maintain the admissibility of pacific blockade assert that vessels of third States cannot be seized. What is controverted is the question whether according to International Law the coast of a State may be blockaded at all in time of peace. From the first recorded instance to the last, several writers[49] of authority have negatived the question. On the other hand, many writers have answered the question in the affirmative, differing among themselves regarding the one point only whether or not vessels sailing under the flag of third States could be prevented from entering or leaving pacifically blockaded ports. The Institute of International Law in 1887 carefully studied, and at its meeting in Heidelberg discussed, the question, and finally voted a declaration[50] in favour of the admissibility of pacific blockades. Thus the most influential body of theorists has approved what had been established before by practice. There ought to be no doubt that the numerous cases of pacific blockade which have occurred during the nineteenth century have, through tacit consent of the members of the Family of Nations, established the admissibility of pacific blockades for the settlement of political as well as of legal international differences.
[49] The leader of these writers is Hautefeuille, Des Droits et des Devoirs des Nations Neutres (2nd ed. 1858, pp. 272-288).
[50] See Annuaire, IX. (1887), pp. 275-301.