I suppose there is a stage in the development of the creature at which opinion may very well vary as to whether it is a tadpole or a full-fledged, or rather a four-footed, frog. Canada, constitutionally, is in a somewhat uncertain case; for, if you say that she is a colony, you will be confronted with some well-developed legs, and if you say that she is an independent state, you will be asked to explain away the remains of the tail. What sort of compromising language a biologist would apply to his dubiosity, I do not know; but, with reference to Canada, I am prepared to make a distinction, — to say that she is nominally a colony, and really an independent state. A veritable bit of the actual tail is still visible; there may not, indeed, be enough for performance of its former function of control, but quite enough to betray the origin of the animal; while the legs can very clearly kick, if not speak, for themselves. Nominally, I say, Canada is a colony; the forms, the nomenclature, the legal appearance still exist. But in reality Canada is independent and governs herself. A short summary of Canadian political history will establish that point.

The question of recognition by an international organization of the representation of a Member State, a question recently considered by the General Assembly of the United Nations as a result of a proposal by Cuba, had previously engaged the attention of several international bodies. For instance, after the Italian conquest of Ethiopia, the Credentials Committeeof the Assembly of the League of Nations was confronted with the issue of the seating of Ethiopian representatives in the Assembly.

The International Court of Justice bom opened and closed the year 2000 with an unprecedented docket of twenty-four cases; during the year, one case was concluded by ajudgment, and a new one was filed.1 Most of the Court's cases, however, were still in “midstream,” with the parties still exchanging written pleadings. The Court held oral proceedings during 2000 in just five cases: final hearings on the merits in two, hearings on jurisdiction leading to ajudgment in a third, and two requests for provisional measures, one granted and the other not. The year was marked by other events of interest, including some that signal important changes in the Court's procedures.

When Count Mouravieff, at the order of the Emperor of Russia, convoked the first peace conference by the circular of the 12th/24th August, 1898, hardly any one foresaw the importance which this first move was to take, which seemed then in the opinion of the writer Mommsen like “ a printer’s error in the history of the world.”

In order to realize the extent of the development to which coming periodical peace conferences are destined it is sufficient to examine the facts of yesterday and the road already traversed.

The object of the first Russian project was very limited; its purpose was to call together a certain number of Powers to study the possibility of “ putting a limit ” on armament for the purpose of diminishing the financial burdens of the states, but the exchanges of opinion which preceded the assembly of these “ disarmament conferences ” having shown that the chances of success were very feeble, a second circular by Mouravieff (January 11, 1899) extended the first program by attaching thereto particularly “the possibility of preventing armed conflicts by pacific means ” and the reduction of “ the laws and customs of war ” to a system of rules. These two new subjects changed the character of the assembly, the title of which even was modified. It was called thenceforth the “ Peace Conference.” And, in fact, the conference in obedience to the very force of things soon completed the transformation of accession to principle, subordinated the premature question of disarmament, and applied its efforts towards justifying its title by concentrating all its force on the matter of pacific adjustment of international conflicts.

Writers on the history of the law of nations, in dealing with neutralization as an accepted practice, have seldom given a satisfactory account of the development of the ideas underlying this unusual phenomenon in international law. They have, in general, been inclined to treat it in a rather fragmentary manner; merely to note in passing certain scattered instances as of minor importance and to devote their major attention to the more outstanding occasions on which the European Powers have settled some given problem by the use of the formula of neutralization. It is thus rendered exceedingly difficult to form an objective appraisal of the ideological forces back of the movement, or effectively to analyze and weigh the constituent elements entering into it. In consequence, the movement has for the most part escaped scientific evaluation.