On account of the natural fact that men are apt to be influenced in their action unconsciously through persons with whom they have constant associations, it is a matter of no mean importance that the armament interests should have been so strongly represented in many capitals by men of high professional and social standing, always on the ground, eager to advance the business in military supplies. In many capitals, very close relationships have grown up between the diplomatic officers and the representatives of the great armament firms. As a mutual apprehension of excessive preparation for war greatly stimulates these industries, it is not surprising that their representatives do not exert themselves to prevent occasional war scares. In fact, highly misleading information on war plans has often been given out, as in the case of a representative of the Coventry Ordnance Works, who in 1909 informed the British Government of excessive shipbuilding by Germany. The news was later found to be erroneous; but new orders had been given in Great Britain, and through action and reaction armaments were stimulated elsewhere. The close connection of the Krupp Iron Works with the German Government and with associations favoring aggressive foreign action is well known.
It has often happened that what represents itself to be a national interest and enlists diplomatic and political support in that way, is really only the enterprise of individuals to make profits. The men who support it with their best energies and talents are not villains, but their method of assuming a great national interest where only a tradition, a prejudice or a private plan of profit are involved, renders their doings far from beneficial to the commonweal. Similarly, those who operate on the principle that the public mind must be nourished with certain carefully selected facts and kept from the knowledge of others, may have honest motives, but their ideas of public action are obsolete or deserve to be so, as they are left over from the absolutist régime in politics.
XI
PARLIAMENT AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS
In considering the relation of legislative bodies, and of the public opinion therein represented, to the conduct of foreign affairs, it will be useful to glance briefly at the relevant historical facts. When the United Colonies of America formed a separate political organization from the mother country, the conduct of foreign affairs was entrusted to a committee of Congress, a successor to the Committee of Secret Correspondence. In 1781 a Secretaryship for Foreign Affairs, with a permanent department, was created and in 1782 the conduct of foreign affairs was regulated in the following terms:
“All letters to sovereign powers, letters of credence, plans of treaties, conventions, manifestoes, instructions, passports, safe conducts, and other acts of Congress relative to the department of foreign affairs, when the substance thereof shall have been previously agreed to in Congress, shall be reduced to form in the office of foreign affairs, and submitted to the opinion of Congress, and when passed, signed and attested, sent to the office of foreign affairs to be countersigned and forwarded.”
Congress therefore retained a very close control over this matter; a control which under the Constitution passed to the Senate, though in a restricted form. In no other country did a legislative committee participate in the conduct of foreign affairs with similar power and influence. The policy of the arrangements under the Constitution is explained by John Jay in the Federalist as follows:
“It seldom happens in the negotiation of treaties, of whatever nature, but that perfect secrecy and immediate despatch are sometime requisite. There are cases where the most useful intelligency may be obtained, if the persons possessing it can be relieved from apprehensions of discovery. Those apprehensions will operate on those persons whether they are actuated by mercenary or friendly motives; and there doubtless are many of both descriptions, who would rely on the secrecy of the President, but who would not confide in that of the Senate, and still less in that of a large popular assembly.”
Jay’s explanation is dominated by the conception which the eighteenth century had of the functions of diplomacy and the conditions of its work. The constitutional system as conceived at that time implied (1) Full power of negotiation in the President, (2) Taking counsel with the Senate, (3) Formal ratification of treaties by the Senate, and publication thereof as parts of the law of the land. The system has been highly praised by European publicists as reconciling the maintenance of confidential relations with publicity of the results, in that treaties are given the character of laws.
In the course of the nineteenth century there occurred many instances resulting in a growing practice of making special agreements by the Secretary of State alone, without the advice and consent of the Senate. When President Roosevelt in 1905 attempted to deal with the Dominican situation in this manner, the Senate objected and insisted that all international agreements of any kind must be submitted to its action. The system of the United States, however, actually permits of the current conduct of foreign affairs without information to the people or even without constant and complete information to the Senate which is, moreover, usually preoccupied with matters of internal legislation.