KLEEN: Lois et Usages de la Neutralité. Paris, 1898.

Rikard Kleen. Scandinavian publicist; born in 1841; studied at the University of Upsala; attaché of the ininistry of justice in 1863; attaché of the legation of Sweden and Norway at Turin, and later at Florence; chief of division of ministry of foreign affairs at Stockholm; secretary of legation at Vienna; member of the Institute of International Law; member of the International Sanitary Conference at Vienna. His publications include Droit naturel (Naturrätt), 5 volumes, 1883-5, Sur la contrebande de guerre (Om Krigskontraband), 1 volume, 1888, and Lois sur la neutralité (Neutralitetens Lagar), 2 volumes, 1889-91.

Volume i, page 20.-In reference to the question of neutrality the year 1780 ushered in a new era which may be regarded as the close of the reign of the Consolato del Mare. It was a period of transition to the new maritime law introduced by the Paris Congress of 1856. This period is characterized by the endeavors of the States at peace to put an end to the uncertainty regarding the rights and the duties of neutrals, to fill in the gaps of the regulation of these rights and duties and to form a union for the purpose of opposing the arbitrary way in which the greatest maritime Power was treating the neutral nations. It was at this time that there manifested itself that remarkable movement against the oppression of a despotic marine, a movement whose initiative was due to the alliance of the Northern Powers, but which was also strongly supported by the insurrection of the great transatlantic colonies against British domination. The American war of independence was a struggle like unto that of the Baltic countries against their common oppressor. The colonies were forced, by reason of the identity of interest and feelings, to take sides with the neutrals against England.

During the North American war of independence, discontent awakened by the exacting pretensions of the great maritime Powers, burst out at last, and the general sentiments of insecurity produced a violent reaction. The less powerful States realized that they had to form a union, and to be the better able to oppose abuses, the first condition was to reach an understanding with regard to the essential points As a result there was formed in 1780 the famous so-called "Armed Neutrality" between Russia, Sweden and Denmark, whose object it

was not merely to determine the just and reasonable principles of neutrality and to rally round them all other governments, but to defend also by armed force any attack upon their rights.

The Russian Government which was joined in this force by the Scandinavian States, formulated the new rules. These rules were part of a declaration which on February 28, 1780, was transmitted by the St. Petersburg ministry, in the first place to the great western maritime Powers, England, France and Spain, and later to the rest. The following five points appeared therein as the future principles of neutrality:

1. Neutral vessels may freely navigate from port to port and along the coasts belonging to the belligerent States without being detained on their course;

2. Enemy merchandise is free under the neutral flag, excepting war contraband:

3. To determine what shall be regarded as war contraband, reference is made to articles 10 and 11 of the treaty concluded on June 20, 1766, between Russia and England, which treaty shall have obligatory force with regard to all the belligerents.1

4. No port shall be regarded as blockaded so long as there is no real and effective danger in entering the same, that is to say, so long as it is not surrounded, by the Power which pretends to forbid entrance to it, by means of stationary and sufficiently nearby vessels.2

5. These principles are to serve as rules in the procedures and decisions of the Prize Tribunals.3

As may be judged from this, the declaration does not in its integrality and in clear terms establish the principles set down in the Utrecht treaty that the quality of the vessel determines the quality of the cargo. To the second proposition that "enemy merchandise is free under neutral flag" there is not joined the correlative disposition that "neutral merchandise is seizable under enemy flag." This was

1The contraband articles specified in this treaty are almost all (excepting saltpeter, sulphur, saddles and bridles) of such a nature as fits them specially tc war use. The list marks therefore a step in advance. It was furthermore agreed that when a neutral vessel was transporting such articles, such quantity of war ammunition as was deemed necessary for the needs of the vessel itself should be regarded as free and exempt from confiscation.

2This rule was a protest against fictitious blockades.

An additional article declares that the Baltic Sea was to be regarded as closed waters within which acts of hostility were forbidden.

also the first time when the said two propositions which had hitherto been usually joined, were no longer found side by side. On the other hand, as nothing expresses the intention of separating them, it was concluded that the armed neutrality probably meant purely and simply to renew the Utrecht principle in this regard. There is no lack of good reasons in support of this interpretation. It is a fact that in the time when the armed neutrality was established, the general practice on the seas was to leave property free when under the neutral flag, with the reservation of the right to seize in the contrary case neutral property under enemy flag. But, if it had been the intention of doing away with this last mentioned right, though its presumed condition was given form of law, mere reflection would have required an explicit. stipulation upon this point. Moreover, peace treaties and other remarkable conventions that have been concluded since 1780 contain anew the two propositions side by side, in exact conformity with the Utrecht rule.

The declaration was transmitted to the neutral governments with the invitation that they adhere thereto. This was done successively apart from Sweden and Denmark which belonged to the original allianceby Holland, Prussia, Austria, Portugal, the Two Sicilies, and lastly by France, Spain and the United States of America. The contracting powers have all accepted the principles of armed neutrality with the obligation not merely to observe and respect these principles, but also to equip and maintain a fleet to uphold and defend them by acting in concert and in common.

Furthermore, within this more enlarged league, Russia and Denmark form together a more intimate union under the name of "Allies of the armed neutrality." These three Powers agreed to defend their cause in common and jointly, so that an attack directed against any one of them through some violation of the right of neutrals would bring simultaneously the other two to its defense.

As could be foreseen, England alone refused her adhesion to this act which was intended to open up a new phase in the regulation of neutrality by establishing principles that should gradually decrease the exclusive domination of the greatest maritime power. The British ministry explained its refusal on the ground of political maxims which it had hitherto constantly followed, and upon its conventions which, as regards treatment on the seas on the part of the British marine, granted to certain privileged States immunities which the other States did not

enjoy. And to these latter England would for nothing in the world concede the advantage that the neutral flag should protect enemy property.

England alone was however not capable of halting the current of ideas of a neutrality more in conformity with right, ideas upheld by many other nations and even by the new opinion which already began to appear everywhere on the horizon. The modern spirit demanded an international, a distributive and equal justice for all the States, and simplicity, frankness, and clarity in the laws. The principles proposed by the armed neutrality had no other object in view than that of substituting fixed rules in the place of the monetary arbitrariness, an objective justice in the place of the whim of the stronger, the precepts of natural law in the place of the shrewdness of an ambitious policy, and at least a relative security for peaceful navigation in the place of maritime brigandage. In the presence of these irrefutable facts, and in the face of the unity and harmony between the States favorable to this reform, the British Government, while avoiding a real adhesion. thereto, was nevertheless compelled to practise a little more moderation in the application of its former rigorous usages. It protested in vague terms, especially against the maxim "the flag protects the merchandise." But it made more than one exception in its favor; it issued instructions to its cruisers enjoining them to proceed with greater prudence toward the neutrals, and to the latter it opened the commerce with the Mediterranean.

The principles of the "armed neutrality" acquired in this manner, if not an exclusive and absolute, at least a decisive, influence over the interpretation of the rights and duties of neutrals during the following period which extended up to the time of the Crimean war. Not all, of course, had been gained by the Declaration of 1780. It provided no protection for neutral property under the enemy flag and did not restrict the right of search. But it put an end to a state of incertitude, of insecurity, and of confusion which, for lack of precise laws accepted by the majority of the States, had controlled ever since the time of the Consolato del Mare. Every nation had followed its own special rule, according to the intention of the moment: not any rule had been estabished on juridical bases as a result of serious negotiations between a considerable number of governments. Though incomplete and defecve, the prmciples of the "armed neutrality" were at least formulated ii exact manner and had been recognized and adopted by almost 、owers of Europe and of America. Faithfully they expressed

the reasons of an international conscience; the motive forces back of them were peace and justice. And lastly, they restricted the pretensions of a single Power of exercising a universal dictatorship unaccompanied by legal sanction and exclusively based upon might. The accord and harmony between the other States, their understanding officially declared and clearly expressed, their demands based upon equity and humanity presented a reassuring guarantee theretofore unknown. It is true that its application could only be of a restricted kind in view of the fact that no serious conflict arising from the divergence of views between England and the States of the League gave to the latter, during the period in question, the opportunity of setting forth the practical consequences of the Declaration. The great significance of the diplomatic act of the year 1780 is rather to be found in the fact that it constitutes a principle and sets forth the expression of a new and more enlightened spirit. Attention had been attracted to the need of a more effective general protection of the right of neutrality, and also to the powerful aid which the reformation of this right could find in the public opinion of the civilized world, because almost all the nations had shown themselves ready to defend more energetically than ever before the interests of the neutrals. After this solemn and collective declaration it was felt everywhere that soon there would rule a better legislation over the conditions in the countries not engaged in war while war was being waged elsewhere, and that the world was on the eve of a new and more liberal solution of the so important questions of the protection of the neutrals against the encroachments of the belligerents. The time of the great reformation in the matter of neutrality may therefore be regarded as having begun with the declaration, of 1780, even though the reform itself was to await for some time its subsequent development, and though it had to suffer from the interruptions brought about as the result of abnormal circumstances.

One of these interruptions, the most deplorable and the most violent which threw Europe once more into a state of anarchy which one had been entitled to believe had long since disappeared, was the result of the wars of the great revolution which broke out soon afterward. The violations of the law of neutrality and the abuses of the laws of war reached then such a stage that it would hardly have been possible. to maintain the modest reform which had been introduced, and even less to continue to develop the same. France and England surpassed one another in reactionary manifestoes addressed to the rest of Europe