The problem of the peace movement is how to abolish the use of force for aggression, and yet to maintain it for police purposes. Force for defense will of course automatically cease when force for aggression is abolished.
The chief problem then of a League of Peace is this: Shall the members of the League “not only keep the peace themselves, but prevent by force if necessary its being broken by others,” as ex-President Roosevelt suggested in his Nobel Peace Address delivered at Christiania, May 5, 1910? Or shall its force be exercised only within its membership and thus be on the side of law and order and never on the side of arbitrary will or tyranny? Or shall it never be used at all? Whichever one of these conceptions finally prevails the Great War has conclusively demonstrated that as long as War Lords exist defensive force must be maintained. Hence the League must be prepared to use force against any nations which will not forswear force. Nevertheless a formula must be devised for disarmament. For unless it is a law of nature that war is to consume all the fruits of progress disarmament somehow and some way must take place. How then can the maintenance of a force for defense and police power be reconciled with the theory of disarmament?
The principles for a League of Peace.
In this way: Let the League of Peace be formed on the following five principles:
First. The nations of the League shall mutually agree to respect the territory and sovereignty of each other.
Second. All questions that cannot be settled by diplomacy shall be arbitrated.
Third. The nations of the League shall provide a periodical assembly to make all rules to become law unless vetoed by a nation within a stated period.
Fourth. The nations shall disarm to the point where the combined forces of the League shall be a certain per cent. higher than those of the most heavily armed nation or alliance outside of the League. Detailed rules for this pro rata disarmament shall be formulated by the Assembly.
Fifth. Any member of the League shall have the right to withdraw on due notice, or may be expelled by the unanimous vote of the others.
The advantages that a nation would gain in becoming a member of such a league are manifest. The risk of war would be eliminated within the League. Obviously the only things that are vital to a nation are its land and its independence. Since each nation in the League will have pledged itself to respect the territory and the sovereignty of every other, a refusal to do so will logically lead to expulsion from the League. Thus every vital question will be automatically reserved from both war and arbitration. All other questions are of secondary importance and can readily be arbitrated.