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CONTINENTAL OPINIONS.

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lected in the latter half, and from this neglect confusion in treatment and forced constructions have arisen.

Recent continental opinion.—Kleen, writing of this attempt to extend the doctrine of contraband to cover services, persons, etc., says:

Quelquefois ont été rangés parmi les articles de contrebande de guerre certains objets qui n'y appartiennent pas, bien que leur transport pour le compte ou à destination d'un belligérant puisse être interdit. Non seulement chez des publicistes mais aussi dans des lois et traités, certaines personnes et communications sont considérées comme une espèce de contrebande, du moment qu'elles ont été apportées à un ennemi ou transportées à cause de lui, de manière à le renforcer ou l'aider dans la guerre, soit matériellement soit même intellectuellement. C'est ainsi que se rencontrent depuis longtemps sur les listes de contrebande des objets tels que "soldats," "troupes," etc., dernièrement aussi "documents."

Comme toutefois cet élargissement de la notion de la contrebande de guerre se conciliait peu avec la terminologie juridique, les personnes et les correspondances n'étant ni des marchandises ni des munitions, tandis que la contrebande a été de tout temps définie comme telles, les choses ainsi intruses dans sa catégorie n'y furent pas toujours rangées de la même façon que les autres objets prohibés, ni sans restriction. Parfois, il est vrai, on les trouve simplement insérées dans les listes comme des articles de contrebande ordinaires. Mais d'autres fois elles y sont ajoutées (“assimilées") sous d'autres dénominations, un peu modifiées, par exemple sous la qualification de contrebande improprement dite ou dans le sens figuré, "quasi-contrebande," "analogues de la contrebande," etc. (La Neutralité, vol. 1,

p. 452.)

Pillet, after speaking of contraband in the ordinary sense, says:

La théorie de la contrebande a trouvé sa place dans une dernière hypothèse bien différente de celles que nous avons considérées jusqu'ici. C'est dans le cas où un navire neutre transporte pour le compte de l'ennemi des troupes, des dépêches, ou certains hauts fonctionnaires, des ambassadeurs par exemple. On appelle ce transport contrebande par analogie. L'analogie, il faut ici le reconnaître, est assez lointaine; il ne s'agit plus de marchandises mais de personnes, et la sanction du transport illicite ne peut consister que dans la seule condamnation du vaisseau. (Les Lois Actuelles de la Guerre, par. 218, p. 330.)

Names given to service.-Whatever the name, a considerable range of actions involving neither the doctrine of contraband nor the doctrine of blockade should have some distinguishing name. Various names have been from time

to time given to some of these actions, such as "accidental contraband," "analogues of contraband," "enemy service," "unneutral service," etc. The terms involving the use of the word "contraband" are admittedly inappropriate and forced. The term "enemy service" would be ambiguous because often used in a sense not involving any of the actions here discussed. The phrase "unneutral service" seems to be the least ambiguous and most distinctly descriptive. The decisions of the courts and the opinions of the writers point clearly to the fact that it is the nature of the service which must be considered in certain cases, while the nature and destination of the goods in case of contraband, and the military condition of the place in the case of blockade, determines the penalties.

Unneutral service and contraband.-Professor Lawrence recently very properly pointed out that: "In truth between the carrying of contraband and the performance of what we may call unneutral service there is a great gulf fixed." (Principles of International Law, p. 624.)

We are now in a position to distinguish clearly between the offense of carrying contraband and the offense of engaging in unneutral service. They are unlike in nature, unlike in proof, and unlike in penalty. To carry contraband is to engage in an ordinary trading transaction which is directed toward a belligerent community simply because a better market is likely to be found there than elsewhere. To perform unneutral service is to interfere in the struggle by doing in aid of a belligerent acts which are in themselves not mercantile but warlike. In order that a cargo of contraband may be condemned as a good prize, the captors must show that it was on the way to a belligerent destination. If without subterfuge it is bound to a neutral port the voyage is innocent, whatever may be the nature of the goods. In the case of unneutral service the destination of the captured vessel is immaterial. The nature of her mission is the all-important point. She may be seized and confiscated when sailing between two neutral ports. The penalty of carrying contraband is the forfeiture of the forbidden goods, the ship being retained as prize of war only under special circumstances. The penalty for unneutral service is first and foremost the confiscation of the vessel, the goods on board being condemned when the owner is involved or when fraud and concealment have been resorted to.

Nothing but confusion can arise from attempting to treat together offenses so widely divergent as the two now under consideration. Ibid., p. 633,

FORMS OF UNNEUTRAL SERVICE.

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Dupuis distinguishes the penalty for carriage of contraband and that for unneutral service. He says:

S'agit-il de contrebande de guerre, c'est d'ordinaire une simple aventure commerciale que tente l'expéditeur et que sert le navire chargé du transport, pour tous deux, le mobile habituel est l'intérêt, l'espoir d'un bénéfice à réaliser. S'agit-il de transports de troupes, d'agents ou de dépêches ennemis, l'ordre d'envoi est dû à de tout autres motifs; ce sont des considérations de guerre qui le dictent; le navire qui l'exécute ne se fait pas l'instrument d'une affaire dont le contre-coup n'atteint qu'indirectement l'ennemi; il se fait le complice d'un acte de guerre dirigé contre lui. Si l'attrait du gain peut être l'unique mobile de sa complicité, il n'en reste pas moins que aide qu'il procure à l'un des belligérants est d'un tout autre ordre que le transport de contrebande de guerre; il revêt un caractère plus grave et une teinte d'hostilité beaucoup plus accentuée. C'est assez pour modifier la nature de l'infraction et pour justifier une sanction plus rigoureuse.

Autorisées par la gravité de l'acte, les sévérites plus grandes de la répression sont d'ailleurs commandées par des nécessités pratiques. Il est plus aisé de dissimuler la présence à bord d'agents ou de dépêches que celle de marchandises de contrebande; l'infraction est d'autant plus facile à commettre que la surveillance est plus facile à déjouer; il faut, pour en détourner, que le risque moins grand d'être découvert soit compensé par le risque plus redoutable d'une sanction plus rude en cas de surprise. Aussi ne se contentet-on pas d'empêcher troupes, agents ou dépêches surpris de parvenir à destination; la confiscation frappe, en principe au moins, le navire qui les porte. (La Guerre Maritime et les Doctrines Anglaises, p. 282.)

Forms of unneutral service.-Asstates have drawn nearer together through the elimination of the barriers of time and space in matters of communication, the possibilities of unneutral service have greatly multiplied. It would not be possible to be neutral in modern days and to maintain with Grotius that it is the duty of those who have no part in the war to do nothing which may favor the party having an unjust cause, or which may hinder the action of the one waging a just war, and in a case of doubt to treat both belligerents alike, in permitting transit, in furnishing provisions to the troops, in refraining from assisting the besieged." (De Jure Belli ac Pacis. Lib. III, C. XVI, iii, i.)

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Modern neutrality proclamations have by various circumlocutions tried to prohibit acts involving assistance by neutral subjects in the performance of warlike acts. The

proclamation of the United States of February 11, 1904, issued in consequence of the Russo-Japanese war, after recognizing the general principle, "free ships, free goods, except contraband of war, and free goods always free, except contraband of war," in a qualified way warns its citizens against unneutral service, saying " that while all persons may lawfully, and without restriction because of the aforesaid state of war, manufacture and sell within the United States arms and munitions of war,' and other articles ordinarily known as 'contraband of war,' yet they can not carry such articles upon the high seas for the use or service of either belligerent, nor can they transport soldiers and officers of either, or attempt to break any blockade which may be lawfully established and maintained during the war without incurring the risk of hostile capture and the penalties denounced by the law of nations in that behalf.”

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The distinction is clearly made in the same war in the proclamation of the Netherlands Government to its citizens in which their attention, and especially that of captains, shipowners, and ship brokers, is directed to the danger and risks consequent on the nonobservance of efficient blockade of the belligerent parties, the conveyance for them of contraband of war or military dispatches (unless in the way of regular postal service), and the execution of any other transport service in their interest." The "Instructions to Blockading Vessels and Cruisers" issued by the Navy Department of the United States, June 20, 1898, as General Order, No. 492, section 16, provides that "a neutral vessel in the service of the enemy in the transportation of troops or military persons is liable to seizure;" and in section 15, that "a neutral vessel carrying hostile dispatches, when sailing as a dispatch vessel practically in the service of the enemy, is liable to seizure, but not when she is a mail packet and carries them in the regular and customary manner."

Hall has given considerable attention to what he terms "analogues of contraband." He says:

With the transport of contraband merchandise is usually classed analogically that of dispatches bearing on the conduct of the war and

RUSSIAN OPINION.

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of persons in the service of a belligerent. It is, however, more correct and not less convenient to place adventures of this kind under a distinct head, the analogy which they possess to the carriage of articles contraband of war being always remote. They differ from it in some cases by involving an intimacy of connection with the belligerent which can not be inferred from the mere transport of contraband of war, and in others implying a purely accidental and almost involuntary association with him. They are invariably something distinctly more or something distinctly less than the transport of contraband amounts to. When they are of the former character they may be undertaken for profit alone, but they are not in the way of mere trade. The neutral individual is not only taking his goods for sale to the best market, irrespectively of the effect which their sale to a particular customer may have on the issue of the war, but he makes a specific bargain to carry dispatches or persons in the service of the belligerent for belligerent purposes. He thus personally enters the service of the belligerent, he contracts as a servant to perform acts intended to affect the issue of the war, and he make himself in effect the enemy of the other belligerent. (Hall, International Law, 5th ed., p. 673.)

A neutral vessel becomes liable to the penalty appropriate to the carriage of persons in the service of a belligerent, either when the latter has so hired it that it has become a transport in his service and that he has entire control over it; or when the persons on board are such in number, importance, or distinction, and at the time the circumstances of their reception are such as to create a reasonable presumption that the owner or his agent intend to aid the belligerent in his war.

In the transport of persons in the service of a belligerent the essence of the offense consists in the intent to help him; if, therefore, this intent can in any way be proved, it is not only immaterial whether the service rendered is important or slight, but it is not even necessary that it shall have an immediate local relation to warlike operations. (Hall, International Law, 5th ed., p. 676.)

The Russian declaration of February 14, 1904, section 7, states that

There are assimilated to contraband of war the following acts, forbidden to neutrals: The transport of enemy troops, the dispatches or correspondence of the enemy, the furnishing of transports or ships of war to the enemy. Neutral vessels guilty of forbidden acts of this character may be, according to circumstances, seized and confiscated. The position taken by Russia is entirely justifiable, and the persons concerned in the service become prisoners of Hall sets forth the contrast as follows:

war.

It will be remembered that in the case of ordinary contraband trade the contraband merchandise is confiscated, but the vessel usually

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