HAGUE COURT

Hokitika Guardian, 24 September 1929, Page 6

HAGUE COURT

A BRITISH CRITIC. (United Press Association—By Electric i Telegraph.—Copyright.) LONDON, Sept. 22. “The signing of the Optional Clause of Geneva’s ‘leap in the dark’ may have most disintegrating effects on the British Empire,” says’Professor J. H. Morgan, in an article in “The Sunday Referee.” “It will almost certainly be used by elements in two of the oversous Dominions and in India, which make no secret of their political objective as being secession from the Empire. 1 The terms of South Africa’s suoscription are obscure, but they suggest a glancing blow at the Privy Council. The Irish Free State has subscribed in unreserved term's of which it is no exaggeration to say that they are calculated to deal a lethal blow at the constitutional structure of the Emj pire. It is true that Britain has signed with a reservation excluding interimperial disputes from the jurisdiction of The Hague Court, but there is a fatal flaw in this reservation. It is that The Hague Court Itself will be the sole judge whether a dispute is.an inter-imperial dispute. By adhering i(0 the Optional Clause, we have, played into the hands of secessionists. The Irish Free State, having signed without any reservation, may summon Britain before The Hague Court to decide its obligations under the Anglo-Irish Agreement. "Worse still, if India gets Dominion status, she may follow the Irish precedent of signing without any. reservationand may summon before the Court the Dominions which exclude Oriental migrants. As was pointed out by New Zealand in 1925, our adhesion to The Hague Court’s compulsory jurisdiction is unnecessary and undesirable, but, if anything is to be gained thereby, we should have taken care to secure that the Empire acted ( unitedly and agreed to have identical ‘ reservations. I fear that, in seeking peace outside the Empire, we have only succeeded in soAving seeds of disr sention within it.”