The territory of neutral States is available for none of the belligerents for the conduct of its military operations.

German War Book, p. 188.

The belligerent States have to respect the inviolability of the neutral and the undisturbed exercise of its sovereignty in its home affairs, to abstain from any attack upon the same, even if the necessity of war should make such an attack desirable. Neutral States, therefore, possess also the right of asylum for single members or adherents of the belligerent Powers, so far as no favor to one or other of them is thereby implied. Even the reception of a smaller or larger detachment of troops which is fleeing from pursuit does not give the pursuer the right to continue his pursuit across the frontier of the neutral territory.

German War Book. p. 197.

Every neutral State can, so long as it itself keeps faith, demand that the same respect shall be paid to it as in time of peace. It is entitled to the presumption that it will observe strict neutrality and will not make use of any declarations or other transactions as a cloak for an injustice against one belligerent in favor of the other, or will use them indifferently for both. This is particularly important in regard to Passes, Commissions, and credentials issued by a neutral State.

Germon War Book, p. 198.

Article 1, Hague Convention V. 1907, is apparently identical with section 228. Austro-Hungarian Manual, 1913.

With reference to a report that the troops of General Diaz, after defeating and routing their adversaries on Mexican soil, pursued them into Texas, where they again attacked and dispersed them, Mr. Evarts instructed the American minister in Mexico: "While it is deemed hardly probable that this unjustifiable invasion of American soil was made in obedience to any specific orders from the Mexican capital, it is, nevertheless, a grave violation of international law, which can not, for a moment, be overlooked. You are instructed to call the attention of the officers of the de facto Government with whom you are holding unofficial intercourse to this case, and to say that the Government of the United States will confidently expect a prompt disavowal of the act, with reparation for its consequences, and the punishment of its perpetrators."

Mr. Evarts, Secretary of State, to Mr. Foster, Minister to Mexico, June 21, 1877, For. Rel. 1877, 413.

MOVEMENT OF TROOPS OR CONVOY ACROSS NEUTRAL TERRITORY-PROHIBITED TO BELLIGERENT.

Belligerents are forbidden to move troops or convoys of either munitions of war or supplies across the territory of a neutral Power. Hague Convention V, 1907, Article 2.

Qualification.

No belligerent power can claim the right of passage through a neutral territory, unless founded upon a previous treaty.

Kent, vol. 1, p. 127.

By the common law of nations, the land forces of the combatants are not allowed to cross a neutral frontier, and the Hague Convention of 1907 on neutrality in land warfare places a wide construction on the prohibition.

Lawrence, p. 622.

The definite prohibition in a great law-making document of the passage of troops through neutral territory puts an end to a controversy which has lasted from the days of Grotius, who upheld a right of passage, to recent times when the great majority of writers denied it.

Lawrence, p. 635.

The very first distinction to be made between different kinds of neutrality is that between perpetual or other neutrality. Perpetual or permanent is the neutrality of States which are neutralized by special treaties of the members of the Family of Nations, as at the present time that of Switzerland, Belgium, and Luxemburg. Apart from duties arising from the fact of their neutralisation which are to be performed in time of peace as well as in time of war, the duties and rights of neutrality are the same for neutralized as for other States. It must be specially observed that this concerns not only the obligation not to assist either belligerent, but likewise the obligation to prevent them from making use of the neutral territory for their military purposes. Thus, Switzerland in 1870 and 1871, during the Franco-German war, properly prevented the transport of troops, recruits, and war material of either belligerent over her territory. Oppenheim, vol. 2, p. 368.

*

*** during the second half of the nineteenth century it became controversial whether a so-called qualified neutrality was neutrality at all, and whether a State, which, in fulfillment of a treaty obligation, rendered some assistance to one of the belligerents, violated its neutrality. The majority of modern writers maintained, correctly I think, that a State was neither neutral or not, and that a State violated its neutrality in case it rendered any assistance whatever to one of the belligerents from any motive whatever. * All doubt in the matter ought now to be removed, since Article 2 of Convention V. of the Second Peace Conference categorically enacts that "belligerents are forbidden to move across the territory of a neutral Power troops or convoys either of munitions of war or of supplies." The principle at the back of this enactment no doubt is that a qualified neutrality has no longer any raison d'être, and that neutrality must in every case be perfect.

Oppenheim, vol. 2, pp. 370–371.

Article 2, Hague Convention V. 1907, is substantially identical with section 229, Austro-Hungarian Manual, 1913.

ESTABLISHMENT OR USE ON NEUTRAL TERRITORY OF APPARATUS FOR COMMUNICATION WITH BELLIGERENT FORCES-PROHIBITED TO BELLIGERENT.

Belligerents are likewise forbidden to:

(a) Erect on the territory of a neutral Power a wireless telegraphy station or other apparatus for the purpose of communicating with belligerent forces on land or sea;

(b) Use any installation of this kind established by them before the war on the territory of a neutral Power for purely military purposes, and which has not been opened for the service of public messages.-Hague Convention V, 1907, Article 3.

In 1904, during the siege of Port Arthur, the Russians erected a wireless telegraphy station in the neutral Chinese port of Chefoo, and thus established communication with the beleaguered fortress. Such an act is now expressly forbidden, and the duty of preventing it laid on the neutral government.

Lawrence, p. 647.

The case which occurred in 1904, during the Russo-Japanese war and the siege of Port Arthur, when the Russians installed an apparatus for wireless telegraphy in Chifu and communicated thereby with the besieged, constituted a violation of neutrality.

Oppenheim, vol. 2, p. 436.

Article 3, Hague Convention V, 1907, is substantially identical with section 230, Austro-Hungarian Manual, 1913.

FORMING CORPS AND OPENING RECRUITING STATIONS ON NEUTRAL TERRITORY-PROHIBITED TO BELLIGERENT.

Corps of combatants cannot be formed nor recruiting agencies opened on the territory of a neutral Power to assist the belligerents. Hague Convention V, 1907, Article 4.

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of

[In 1793], the Minister of France asserted the right enlisting men, within the neutral territory of the United States. Examining this question under the law of nations and the general usage of mankind, the American government produced proofs, from the most enlightened and approved writers on the subject, that a neutral nation must, in respect to the war, observe an exact impartiality towards the belligerent parties; that favors to the one, to the prejudice of the other, would import a fraudulent neutrality, of which no nation would be the dupe; that no succor ought to be given to either. unless stipulated by treaty, in men, arms, or any thing else, directly serving for war; that the right of raising troops being one of the rights of sovereignty, and consequently appertaining exclusively to the nation itself, no foreign power can levy men within the territory without its consent;

* ** *

Dana's Wheaton, p. 519; Mr. Jefferson's letter to M. G. Morris, August 16, 1793; Waite's State Pap. 1, 140.

It was stated [by the United States Government in 1793] that if the neutral power might not, consistently with its neutrality, furnish men to either party for their aid in war, as little could either enrol them in the neutral territory. The authority both of Wolfius and Vattel was appealed to in order to show, that the levying of troops is an exclusive prerogative of sovereignty, which no foreign power can lawfully exercise within the territory of another State, without its express permission.

Dana's Wheaton, p. 533.

The same objection was made by the United States, in the war of 1793, against the enlisting of men by the respective belligerent powers within our ports, and it was declared that if the neutral state might not, consistenly with its neutrality, furnish men to either party for their aid in war, it was equally unlawful for either belligerent to enrol them in the neutral territory. Wolfius says that "it is not permitted to raise soldiers on the territory of another, without the consent of its sovereign." Vattel says that," As the right of levying soldiers belongs solely to the nation or the sovereign, no person must attempt to enlist soldiers in a foreign country, without the permission of the sovereign."

Halleck, p. 525.

During the late Crimean war it came to light that certain British consuls were persuading persons within our bounds to go out of the

United States in order to enlist in that service, and that the minister at Washington was aiding therein. It could not be complained of, if the United States government showed displeasure at such proceedings, demanded his removal, and even ceased to hold communication with him as the agent of the British Government. In what, now, did his offense consist,-in a breach of our law only or in a violation of international law? In answer it may be said, that if the earlier usage is to decide, there was no direct breach of international law; if the more modern, there was a breach. But supposing this to be doubtful, in breaking our laws of neutrality, which have the peculiar character of supporting the laws of nations, and that too when he was the representative of another sovereignty, he attacked the Sovereignty of the nation, and in this way came in conflict with law international, which aims to secure the sovereignty of all the nations who acknowledge it. And even if our law could have been evaded by inducing men to go abroad for another object, and there persuading them to enlist in a war against one of our friends, there would still have remained ground of complaint against the agents in such a scheme, as disturbers of our relations with a friendly power.

Woolsey, pp. 288, 289.

The fighting forces of a belligerent may not be reinforced or recruited in neutral territory.

Lawrence, p. 617.

While the laws of the Union are thus peremptory in their prohibition of the equipment or armament of belligerent cruisers in our ports, they provide not less absolutely that no person shall, within the territory or jurisdiction of the United States, enlist or enter himself, or hire or retain another person to enlist or enter himself, or to go beyond the limits or jurisdiction of the United States with intent to be enlisted or entered, in the service of any foreign state, either as a soldier or as a marine or seaman on board of any vessel of war, letter of marque, or privateer. And these enactments are also in strict conformity with the law of nations, which declares that no state has the right to raise troops for land or sea service in another state without its consent, and that, whether forbidden by the municipal law or not, the very attempt to do it without such consent is an attack on the national sovereignty.

Such being the public rights and the municipal law of the United States, no solicitude on the subject was entertained by this Government when, a year since, the British Parliament passed an act to provide for the enlistment of foreigners in the military service of Great Britain. Nothing on the face of the act or in its public history indicated that the British Government proposed to attempt recruitment in the United States, nor did it ever give intimation of such intention to this Government. It was a matter of surprise, therefore, to find subsequently that the engagement of persons within the United States to proceed to Halifax, in the British province of Nova Scotia, and there enlist in the service of Great Britain, was going on extensively, with little or no disguise. Ordinary legal steps were immediately taken to arrest and punish parties concerned, and so put an end to acts infringing the municipal law and derogatory to our sovereignty. Meanwhile suitable representations on the subject were addressed to the British Government.