The highlights of the thirty-second year of the International Court of Justice are to be found in the judgment on the merits of the Ambatielos Case, in the judgment of the Minquiers and Ecrehos Case, and in the judgment on the preliminary objection advanced by Guatemala in the Nottebohm Case.

It would appear that the treaty-making procedure, long considered too cumbersome and too difficult, has suddenly become too easy. Almost from the beginning, the system whereby one-third plus one of the Senate membership can block any treaty, has been denounced as “undemocratic,” and as “government by minority.” In fact, as late as 1945 the House of Representatives approved a Constitutional Amendment to permit the approval of any treaty by a mere majority vote of the two Houses.

“The treaty-making power is an extraordinary power liable to abuse. Treaties make international law and also they make domestic law. Under our Constitution treaties become the supreme law of the land. They are indeed more supreme than ordinary laws, for congressional laws are invalid if they do not conform to the Constitution, whereas treaty law can override the Constitution. Treaties, for example, can take powers away from the Congress and give them to the President; they can take powers from the States and give them to the Federal Government or to some international body, and they can cut across the rights given the people by their constitutional Bill of Rights.”

The question of undertaking preparatory work for a possible revision of the Charter of the United Nations was considered at some length by the General Assembly at its eighth session. It aroused widespread interest particularly in view of the provisions of Article 109, paragraph 3, of the Charter, which provides that the proposal to convene a general conference for the purpose of reviewing the Charter shall be placed on the agenda of the tenth annual session of the General Assembly if such a conference has not been held before that session.