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International Law and Global Ideological Conflict: Reflections on the Universality of International Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2017

Kurt Wilk
Kurt Wilk*
Affiliation:
Wells College
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Extract

If, after the nineteenth century, there remained any question concerning the universality of international law, or of its fundamental rules, it appeared to be largely one of legal history. But as the world of the twentieth century has come to be divided by political ideologies, their legal ramifications have given the question new actuality as one of basic legal theory. That the Family of Nations, or the subjects of international law, embraced virtually all states of the world seemed no longer open to serious doubt when non-Christian states wholly outside Europe took part in the Hague Peace Conferences of 1899 and 1907 and when participation by such states was continued and further extended in the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and in the League of Nations. Yet the same period that saw the unquestioned global expansion of international law has had to face new challenges to its unity as a single, universally valid legal system. They were raised chiefly by German Nazis and Soviet Communists, or in turn against them by their respective critics and opponents. Confronted with these challenges, the universal validity of international law appears no longer as an existingphenomenon that may be traced back to its origins and on to its eventual completion, but as a debatable assumption that stands to be justified or rejected in the light of fresh examination.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 45 , Issue 4 , October 1951 , pp. 648 - 670
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 1951

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References

1 See e.g., against Communist doctrine: M. Chakste, “Soviet Concepts of the State,International Law and Sovereignty” (this JOURNAL, Vol. 43 (1949), p. 21): “ If ‘thegreat capitalist states reflecting the interests of the influential reactionary groups’are not expressly mentioned in this passage [by E. Korovin, quoted infra, note 8], that does not mean that Soviet legal theory can admit the existence of a code of international law that would be equally acceptable to these states and the Soviet state. The very substance of the Marxist and Leninist theory precludes such a possibility” (Ibid., pp. 29-30); against Nazi doctrine: F. Neumann, Behemoth (1942), pp. 166-171; for arguments in Nazi writings against the compatibility of the Soviet system with international law: Beckhoff, Völkerrecht gegen Bolschewismus (1937).

2 L. Oppenheim, International Law (6th ed. by H. Lauterpacht, 1947), Vol. 1, p. 48.

3 C. C. Hyde, International Law Chiefly as Interpreted and Applied by the United States (2nd ed., 1947), Vol. 1, p. 2.

4 J. L. Kunz, “Revolutionary Creation of Norms of International Law,” this JOURNAL,Vol. 41 (1947), p. 119, at p. 122.

5 See, again, Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 45-48; also, e.g., C. G.Fenwick, International Law (2nd ed., 1934), Ch. I ; T. J. Lawrence, The Principles of International Law (1895), esp. pp. 4-5, 53-54; C. H. Stockton, Outlines of International Law (1914), Ch. III ; and, with emphasis on the close relation of the law to social structure, G. Niemeyer, Law Without Force (1941), Chs. I-III. But see the observations by J. L. Brierly, The Law of Nations (4th ed., 1949), pp. 42-46.

6 H. Richter, “Völkerrecht” Deutsches Recht (1934), p. 206, at p. 208, as transl. by V. Gott, “The National Socialist Theory of International Law” this JOURNAL, Vol. 32 (1938), p. 704, at p. 712.

7 W. Best, “Rechtsbegriff und Völkerrecht” Deutsches Recht (1939), p. 1345, at p.1347, as transl. by Neumann, op. cit., p. 170.

8 E. A. Korovin, “The Second World War and International Law,”this JOURNAL, Vol. 40 (1946), p. 742, at pp. 742-743.

9 A. Y. Vyshinsky (ed.), The Law of the Soviet State (H. W. Babb, tr., 1948), p.235. On the place of this book for study and reference in the Soviet Government, see J. N. Hazard’s Introduction, ibid., p. vi.

10 It is in the latter sense that the existence of universal international law is affirmed in Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 48-53, and in Hyde, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp.2-3. Sometimes universal in this sense of global international law is called “general international law” as by H. Kelsen, General Theory of Law and State (A. Wedberg tr., 1946), p. 326, or L. Gross, “International Law” in J. S. Roucek, G. B. deHuszar (eds.), Introduction to Political Science (1950), p. 622, at pp. 625-626. Similarly, what is here called relatively universal international law, as distinguished especially from particular treaty law, is often called “general” as in Diversion of Water from the River Meuse, Permanent Court of International Justice (Judgment, June 28, 1937), Separate Opinion by Judge van Eysinga, Ser. A/B, No. 70 at p. 53; or “generally accepted,” as in German Interests in Polish Upper Silesia, P. C. I. J. (Judgment (Merits),May 25, 1926), Ser. A, No. 7 at pp. 22, 42; The Chorzów Factory, P. C. I. J. (Judgment(Jurisdiction), July 26, 1927), Ser. A, No. 9 at p. 27; id., P. C. I. J. (Judgment (Interpretation),Dec. 16, 1927), Ser. A, No. 13 at p. 19; or “common” as in Pajzs, Czáky and Esterházy Case, P. C. I. J. (Judgment, Dee. 16, 1936), Separate Opinion by Judge Hudson, Ser. A/B, No. 68 at p. 80; Electricity Company of Sofia and Bulgaria, P. C. I. J.(Judgment (Preliminary Objection), April 4, 1939), Separate Opinion by Judge Anzilotti,Ser. A/B, No. 77 at p. 98; or “ordinary” as in Pajzs, Czáky and Esterházy CaseSeparate Opinion by Judge Hammarskjöld, loc. cit., at p. 89; Electricity Company of Sofia and Bulgaria, Separate Opinion by Judge de Visscher, loc. cit., at p. 138.

11 See the classical formulations of the rational basis of natural law in H. Grotius, De Jure Belli ac Pacis (1625), Prolegomena, secs. 6-10, 30; Bk. I, Ch. I, sec. 10; and S.Pufendorf, De Jure Naturae et Gentium (1673), Bk. II, Ch. III, esp. secs. 13-15, 23. Cf.J. Dabin, “General Theory of Law” in The Legal Philosophies of Lask, Radbruch, and Dabin (K. Wilk, tr., 1950), pp. 419-420, who, however, takes the universally and immutably valid natural law of the Schoolmen and the “Law of Nature and of Nations School” for a body of moral and “political” (i.e., societal) rather than juridical rules, ibid., at pp. 422-431.

12 H. Kelsen, General Theory of Law and State (A. Wedberg, tr., 1946), p. 363.

13 The writer’s criticism of basic conceptions of the pure theory of law has been formulated in “Law and the State as Pure Ideas” Ethics, Vol. 51 (1941), p. 158.

14 The last is stressed by G. L. Field, “Law as an Objective Political Concept” 43 American Political Science Review (1949), 229.

15 Pufendorf, op. cit. (supra, note 11); cf. Grotius, op. cit., Prolegomena, sec. 30.

16 G. Scelle, Précis de Droit des Gens (1932-34); J. L. Brierly, The Law of Nations,pp. 50-57; The Outlook for International Law (1944), pp. 4 - 5 ; also, apparently, P. C. Jessup, A Modern Law of Nations (1948), pp. 3, 7-8.

17 Represented, respectively, by G. Jellinek, Die rechtliche Natur der Staatenverträge(1880); H. Triepel, Völkerrecht und Landesrecht (1899); and Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, at pp. 10, 16-19.

18 Hyde, op. cit., Vol. 1, p. 5.

19 E. M. Borchard, “International Law” Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (1932),Vol. 8, p. 167.

20 Kelsen, op. cit., pp. xv, 29-42, 110-122; Law and Peace in International Relations(1942), pp. 14-16.

21 J. Austin, Lectures on Jurisprudence (3rd ed., 1863), esp. Lecture VI. That Austin’s own conception, as distinct from that of some of his followers, is to be understood as a set of logical premises rather than an ethical or sociological foundation of the law is stressed in J. Stone, The Province and Function of Law (2nd printing, 1950), Ch. II, esp. at pp. 59-64.

22 H. J. Morgenthau, “Positivism, Functionalism, and International Law” this JOURNAL, Vol. 34 (1940), p. 260, at pp. 276-278.

23 Cf. the controversy on American legal realism, e.g., between R. Pound, “The Call for a Realistic Jurisprudence,” 44 Harvard Law Review (1931), 697, and K. N. Llewellyn, “A Realistic Jurisprudence—The Next Step,” 30 Columbia Law Rev. (1930), 431; “Some Realism about Realism,” 44 Harvard Law Rev. (1931), 1222. And see K. N. Llewellyn, “On Reading and Using the New Jurisprudence,” 40 Columbia Law Rev.(1941) 581; E. N. Garlan, Legal Realism and Justice (1941); Stone, op. cit., pp. 406-417.

24 E.g., Vyshinsky, op. cit., pp. 5-38, 38-62. “ In fact law is … a living reality, expressing the essence of social relationships between classes on the basis of the dominance, domination, repression, and subjection, by the dominant classes, of other classes who are subordinate to this dominance” ibid., at p. 38. Cf. R. Schlesinger, Soviet Legal Theory(1945); H. Berman, “The Challenge of Soviet Law,” 62 Harvard Law Rev. (1948-49)220, 449.

25 In the words of Stone, op. cit., Ch. XXIV, secs. 3-7, their doctrines are “denials of the identity of law.”

26 International law in this sense is usually dated from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; see, e.g., J. L. Brierly, The Law of Nations, p. 1; Hyde, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp.1-2; Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, p. 68. Sometimes it is traced back to a much earlier period, as to the medieval Renaissance in Italy, beginning with the twelfth century, by A. P. Sereni, The Italian Conception of International Law (1943), pp. 10-124, esp. at pp. 118-124. International law in the strict sense is specifically distinguished from the “law of nations” as a wider concept, embracing also legal rules observed between political communities prior to or outside of international law, by A. Nussbaum, A Concise History of the Law of Nations (1947), pp. 1-2, and cf. pp. 23, 27-29, 53. But sometimes such a distinction is not clearly made in the history of international law doctrines, and emphasis is placed on the continuity that can be shown to exist between earlier and modern doctrines or institutions, rather than on the features which set off the international law of the modern age as a distinctive body of law or legal order, though one incorporating many earlier rules; e.g., J. Eppstein, The Catholic Tradition of the Law of Nations (1935); Baron M. de Taube, “ L’apport de Byzance au développement du droit international occidental” Académie de Droit international de La Haye, Recueil des Cours, Vol. 67 (1939), p. 237.

27 Among the latest contributions to this persistent controversy may be singled out, on the one hand, H. J . Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations (1948), pp. 243-263, and onthe other, J . Maritain, “ The Concept of Sovereignty,” 44 Am. Pol. Sci. Rev. (1950) 343.

28 Such as relations between non-sovereign states within a federal union, as in the United States in numerous cases before the Supreme Court; e.g., New Jersey v. Delaware, 291 U. S. 361 (1934), or in Germany, e.g., Baden v. Württemberg, 116 Reichsgericht in Zivilsachen Anhang 18 (Staatsgerichtshof, 1927), Annual Digest, Case No. 86 (1927-28), or Switzerland, e.g., Thurgau v. St. Gallen (Bundesgericht, 1928), Annual Digest, Case No. 289 (1927-28); or relations between a sovereign and an (internationally) nonsovereign state, as in the British Empire, upon a statement of a Secretary of State to the effect that the Crown treats the latter state as sovereign, Mighell v. Sultan of Johore,[1894] 1 Q. B. 149; Duff Development Co. v. Kelantan Government, [1924] A. C. 797 (H.L.) ; or relations of states with an international organization created by treaty, such asthe United Nations, Reparation for Injuries Suffered in the Service of the United Nations, International Court of Justice (Advisory Opinion, April 11, 1949), I. C. J. Reports, 1949, p. 174; and see U. N. Charter, Art. 43 ; or with a person or authority recognized as having a special international status, as in the case of the Papacy during the period of the “Roman question” from 1870 to 1929, or conceivably with other individuals or persons, cf. Jessup, op. cit., esp. pp. 8-10, 12-14, 15-26.

29 Cf. on the one hand, Sereni, op. cit., esp. pp. 56-65, 118-124; and on the other, L.Gross, “The Peace of Westphalia 1648-1948” this JOURNAL, Vol. 42 (1948), p. 20, at pp.30-34; Nussbaum, op. cit., pp. 23-27, 28-37.

30 On Byzantine and Moslem laws on foreign affairs and relations with the West, cf. M. de Taube, “Etudes sur le développement historique du droit international dans l’Europe orientale” Académie de Droit international de La Haye, Recueil des Cours, Vol.11 (1926), p. 345, and op. cit. (supra, note 26); M. Khadduri, The Law of War andPeace in Islam (1940); Nussbaum, op. cit., pp. 27-28, 37-38; Sereni, op. cit., pp. 18-28, 53.

31 Cf. Sir G. Butler and S. Maccoby, The Development of International Law (1928), Ch. I ; Gross, loc. cit. (supra, note 29), at pp. 28-29; Nussbaum, op. cit., pp. 86-87. Contra, in part, the conclusion in Sereni, op. cit., pp. 118-124.

32 Pufendorf (supra, note 11).

33 “The New Testament I use in order to explain—and this cannot be learned fromany other source—what is permissible to Christians. This, however—contrary to the practice of most men—I have distinguished from the law of nature, considering it ascertain that in that most holy law a greater degree of moral perfection is enjoined upon us than the law of nature, alone and by itself, would require.” Grotius, op. cit. (Kelsey tr., 1925), Prolegomena, sec. 50. For Grotius’ distinction between the law of nations and the law of nature, see ibid., secs. 17, 40. See also R. H. Dana’s Wheaton, Elements of International Law (8th ed., 1866), pp. 17-18.

34 Suggested in the titles of the works of proclaimed positivists of the eighteenth century: J. J. Moser, Versuch des neuesten europäischen Völkerrechts (12 vols., 1777-80); and G. F. von Martens, Précis du droit des gens moderne de l’Europe fondé sur lestraités et l’usage (1789); followed in the nineteenth century by J. L. Klüber, Europäisches Völkerrecht (1821); A. W. Heffter, Das europäische Vöcerrecht der Gegenwart(1844; 8th ed. by Geffcken, 1888); P. Pradier-Fodéré, Traié de droit international public européen et américain (8 vols., 1885-1906); and others. Cf. W. E. Hall, A Treatise on International Law (4th ed., 1895), pp. 42-44; A. Hershey, The Essentials of International Public Law (1912), pp. 18-19, 96-97; G. G. Wilson, Handbook of International Law (2nd ed., 1927), pp. 25-26.

35 See e.g., L. Oppenheim, op. cit. (1st ed., 1905), Vol. 1, pp. 32-34, 62, 68, 71, and Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit. (6th ed., 1947), Vol. 1, pp. 45-47; C. Eagleton, International Government (rev. ed., 1948), p. 66. Cf. Hershey, op. cit., pp. 97-98; Hyde, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 127-129; J. Westlake, International Law (2nd ed., 1910), Vol. 1, p. 40; Wilson, op. cit., pp. 18-19.

36 Russia was a party to peace treaties with other European Powers in the seventeenth century; cf. Oppenheim, op. cit. (1st ed., 1905), Vol. I, p. 62; Butler and Maccoby, op. cit., pp. 101-102. Turkey, whose political relations and agreements with sovereign European Powers date back to the Capitulations with France in 1535, was a party to separate peace and truce treaties with individual European Powers at Carlowitz in 1698 and to a number of treaties prior to 1856 referring to application of rules of international law between itself and the contracting European Power; cf. Butler and Maccoby, ibid.; H. A. Smith, Great Britain and the Law of Nations (1932), Vol. I, pp. 16-18; H. McK. Wood, “The Treaty of Paris and Turkey’s Status in International Law,” this JOURNAL, Vol. 37 (1943), p. 262, concluding that Turkey’s participation in international law antedates 1856; and, on the other hand, The S. S. Lotus, P. C. I. J. (Judgment, Sept.7, 1927), Dissenting Opinion by Judge Weiss, Ser. A, No. 10 at p. 40, considering Turkey as subject solely to international law only since the Peace Treaty of Lausanne of 1923. Illustrative of earlier treaty relations with European Powers, or legislation referring to international law, on the part of other countries of non-European civilization are the following: Chinese-British Treaty, Aug. 29, 1842, 30 British and Foreign State Papers 398; Chinese-U. S. Treaty, July 3, 1844, 4 Miller 559; Chinese-French Treaty, Oct. 24, 1844, 34 B. & F. S. P. 1298; also Japanese-U. S. Treaty, July 29, 1858, 1 Malloy 1000, 48 B. & F. S. P. 596; Japanese-Russian Treaty, Oct. 12/24, 1857, 57 B. & F. S. P. 1057; Japanese Proclamation of Neutrality, Aug. 29, 1870, Déak and Jessup, Collection of Neutrality Laws, Vol. I, p. 736; also Persian-Russian Treaty, Feb. 10/22, 1828, 45 B. & F. S. P. 865; Siamese-British Treaty, June 20, 1826, 23 B. & F. S. P. 1153; note of Siamese Minister for Foreign Affairs to American Minister at Bangkok, April 30, 1898, Déak and Jessup, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 920. Cf. also U. S. treaties with Morocco, June 28, 1786, 2 Miller 185; Algiers, Sept. 5, 1795, ibid., p. 275; Tripoli, Nov. 4, 1796, ibid., p. 349; Tunis,Aug. 28, 1797, ibid., p. 386.

37 Cf. A. Hamilton, Letters of Camillus, No. 20, quoted in J. B. Moore, Digest of International Law (1906), Vol. 1, pp. 10-11.

38 League of Nations Covenant, Preamble and Art. 1, par. 2 (“its sincere intention to observe its international obligations”); U. N. Charter, Preamble, Arts. 1 and 2, Art.4, par. 1 (“accept the obligations contained in the present Charter and … are able and willing to carry out these obligations”), Art. 6 (“violated the Principles contained in the present Charter”).

39 For a recent summary of the increase in the number of states during the first half of this century, see H. W. Briggs, “Community Interest in the Emergence of New States: The Problem of Recognition” Proceedings, American Society of InternationalLaw, 1950, p. 169, at pp. 170-171.

40 E. A. Korovin, Das Völkerrecht der Uebergangszeit(German tr., 1929, from the 2nd Russian ed. of 1925); E. B. Pasehukanis, Allgemeine Rechtslehre und Marxismus (German tr., 1929); Korovin, “The Second “World War and International Law” cited supra,note 8. Cf. T. A. Taracouzio, The Soviet Union and International Law (1935), pp. 10-11, 12; J. N. Hazard, “Cleansing Soviet International Law of Anti-Marxist Theories,” this JOURNAL, Vol. 32 (1938), p. 244, and “The Soviet Union and International Law,” 43 Illinois Law Rev. (1948) 591; J. Florin and J. H. Herz, “Bolshevist and National-Socialist Doctrines of International Law,” Social Research, Vol. 7 (1940), p. 1. Cf. also R. Schlesinger, Soviet Legal Theory (1945), pp. 275-290; Nussbaum, op. cit., pp. 287-292; and literature cited ibid., pp. 344-345, and in Lauterpacht’s Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, p. 52, note 1.

41 See the statements by Korovin and Vyshinsky, quoted supra, p. 650.

42 E.g., I. P. Trainin, “Questions of Guerrilla Warfare in the Law of War” this JOURNAL, Vol. 40 (1946), p. 534, at p. 535, observes: “Even a great and powerful state cannot appear in the international arena without taking into consideration some of the rules (on questions relating to railroads, the telegraph, navigation, struggles against epidemics,etc.) which are called forth by the logic of developing economic relationships.”Korovin in his earlier work acknowledged the possibility of some common values as wellas material interests, Das Völkerrecht der Uebergangszeit, pp. 12-14: “The communitybased on intellectual unity (solidarity of ideas) disappears as a rule between countries of bourgeois and socialist civilizations, and the complex of legal norms corresponding to it becomes obsolete. Yet this does not exclude the possibility of partial legal intercourse based on the acknowledgment of the values of a universally human order, i.e., thosevalues which are not bound to a limited epoch and sharply defined order of political andsocial forms, e.g., the struggle against epidemics, protection of archaeological, artisticand other monuments, etc .” As regards “ the question of the international community in the sphere of material interests in the strict sense of the word (economic needs, commercial intercourse, etc.),” he distinguished “1 .international legal relations of a technicaltype, and 2. those concerning the definition of material interests with a social content.Included in the first category must be all sorts of treaties and acts regarding postaland telegraphic communications, railroads and navigation, monetary units, the metric system of weights and measures, etc. To the second group belong commercial treaties,international agreements for the protection of industrial property, concerning the conflictof laws, etc .” Pre-socialist agreements of the first, but not of the second group,under socialism “ not only retain their full value but acquire a new, deeper significance.” (Writer's tr.). More recently, in the article cited (supra, note 8), at p. 743, Korovin defines international law in the coming period of history, more sweepingly and with interesting ambiguity, as “legal norms guaranteeing international protection of the democratic minimum.” At the end of the development of international law through the whole transitional period, of which “the coming period” appears to be a phase, he expected the sole survival of “intersoviet law” as a universal law. Das Völkerrecht der Uebergangszeit, p. 142.

43 H. Kraus, “Das zwischenstaatliche Weltbild des Nationalsozialismus” 62 Juristische Wochenschrift (1933) 2418; G. A. Walz, “Das Verhältnis von Völkerrecht und staaflichem Recht nach nationalsozialistischer Rechtsauffassung” 18 Zeitschrift für Völkerrecht (1934) 145; V. Bruns, Völkerrecht und Politik (1934); E. Wolgast, Völkerrecht(1934). On the connections between the assumptions of these authors and pre-Nazi German writings, see L. Preuss, “National Socialist Conceptions of InternationalLaw” 29 Am. Pol. Sci. Eev. (1935) 594, at 597-605.

44 H. Nicolai, Die rassengesetzliche Bechtslehre (1932); N. Gurke, Volk und Vdlkerrecht(1935), and Grundziige des Vblkerrechts (1936); W. Best, “ Bechtsbegriff undVdlkerrecht“ (supra, note 7) ; C. Schmitt, Vdlkerrechtliche Grossraumordnung mit Interventionsverhotfur raumfremde Mdchte (1939). Cf., on the successive phases of Nazidoctrines and pronouncements on international law, Preuss, op. cit. (supra, note 43);Gott, op. cit. (supra, note 6); Florin and Herz, op. cit. (supra, note 40); F. Neumann,Behemoth (1942), pp. 150-171; Nussbaum, op. cit., pp. 278-280. On the virtual absenceof similar doctrines under Italian Fascism, see Sereni, op. cit., pp. 269-278.

45 Charter, Art. 1, pars. 1, 2, 3; Art. 2, pars. 1, 3, 4.

46 Covenant, Art. 17; Charter, Art. 2, par. 6. See, for the prevailing view, F. Boxburgh,International Conventions and Third States (1917); Hyde, op. cit., Vol. 2, pp.1466-1467; Lauterpaeht's Oppenheim, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 831-834. But see ibid,.,at p. 834: “ I t cannot be admitted that the International Court of Justice or anyother organ of the United Nations established under the Charter would be at libertyto hold that action taken in pursuance of Article 2 is contrary to International Law”and note 3; H. Kelsen, The Law of the United Nations (1950), pp. 106-110; and cf.Jessup, op. cit., pp. 132-136.

47 Such a pluralism of partial systems of international law would be divisive beyondthe pluralism envisaged by Korovin, Das VoVkerrecht der Ubergangszeit, pp. 7-8. While he denies the existence of a universal international law, the particular legal systems which he assumes are overlapping rather than separate: an international law of European major Powers, of American states, between major and secondary states, between capitalist and colonial or semi-colonial countries, and between socialist and bourgeois states. The same state may thus be bound by rules of one or the other system depending upon what other state is involved with it in a particular international legal relationship.