AMERICA TO AFFIX SIGNATURE TO WORLD COURT PROTOCOLS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18940, 10 December 1929, Page 10

AMERICA TO AFFIX SIGNATURE TO WORLD COURT PROTOCOLS.

(United Press Assn.—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.)

The signature of the United States, making adherence to the Permanent C ° urt °f International Justice, will be affixed to the necessary documents at Geneva to-morrow, is an announcement made by the State Department, on the authority of President Hoover. The three protocols that will be signed, must be submitted to the Senate for ratification.

Three years ago the United States Senate voted in favour of adhering to the Permanent Court of International Justice, provided that certain reservations were accepted. Following upon protracted negotiations with the existing members of the Court, Mr Elihu Root and Sir Cecil Hurst finally drafted a protocol that was accepted, last March. At the recent meeting of the Council of the League of Nations the protocol was ratified by that body. The reservations imposed by the United States Senate resolved into two main points:— The present rules of the Court, under which advisory opinions shall be rendered publicly, shall not be changed. This was in view of the danger that at some time in the future a majority of the judges might agree to render secret opinions.

The Permanent Court was not, without the consent of the United States, to entertain any request for an advisory opinion touching any dispute or question “in which the United States had or claimed an interest.’’ The request appeared to postulate a privileged position and to grant the United States a veto more arbitrary than that possessed by any of the existing signatones However, President Hoover and Mr Kellogg made it clear that the United States demanded no special privilege. The difficulty arose from the fact that, not being a member of the League, she had not the right to vote in the Council or the Assembly The reservation gives the United States exactly the same power as that enjoved by a member of the League, which from that position has the power to stop any request for an advisory opinion because the Council proceeds by unanimity.

The protocol provides that, when a member of the League desires an advisory opinion from the Court in any matter in which the United States is concerned, the Registrar shall notifv the United States, and the American Government would have the right of staying the proceedings for a definite and limited period. In the last resort the United States has the option of withdrawing from the Court.