Geneva—Where the League of Nations Is Considering Samoa’s Case

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 382, 16 June 1928, Page 26

Geneva —Where the League of Nations Is Considering Samoa’s Case

HBNEVA is now the home of half a hundred international organisations, and so assumes a consequential role in the news columns of the day. Whether it be the Assembly or the Council of the League of Nations, an international economic confere# e or a meeting of the smaller but none the less important Disarmament Commission, the front-page Geneva date line catches the eye, giving the impression of a conglomerate mass of humanity hastening to this city on the shores of Lac Leman to discuss anything from the Upper Silesian water supply to the observance of the Sabbath. A stroll across the Pont du Mont Blanc or along Quai Wilson brings into view not only the machinery of international life, hut its headlined personalities as well. The passing of a legation car bearing a Briand, a Stresemann or a Chamberlain may awaken no more than ordinary interest in the breasts of the stolid Genevese. To the visitor, however, such an occasion marks his trip as a success. To an ever-increasing number Geneva is becoming a shrine of internationalism, and these are ever ready to take advantage of the thousand and one opportunities present. Seldom, however, does the visitor see the old Geneva, the city that existed as an enterprising centre of trade from the Middle Ages to the close of the Great War. It is doubtful, moreover, if the thousands of permanent guests of the city, connected in official capacities with the various international agencies, see further into its heart than do the swarms of visitors.

In the fact that the real Geneva has been so completely eclipsed from the public mind since the war lies the great difference between the Geneva of 1918 and that of 1928. Ten years ago one found a solid, busy, commercity city. It was justly famed for its manufactures of watches and jewellery, a little known for its part in the historic period of Calvin and the Reformation, and regarded as a convenient step-over between Paris and the Italian lakes.

The war seriously disrupted commercial prosperity here as everywhere else. Hotel-keepers and jewellery firms were naturally the first to feel the impact of a money scarcity, and it was some five years after the signing of the armistice before ‘they regained their economic stability. Commemorative tablets on the sites of both French and the German consulates attest to the relatively large proportion of citizenry who were directly involved in the conflict, even on opposing sides. But in spite of the close connection between Geneva and the world conflagration, the “soul” of the city remained almost unchanged by it all. There was none of that abrupt tearing away of existing social and political institutions as at Vienna; the political hierarchy has not even changed to a pale pink. Then, as now, in fact, the Genevese citizen retained that conservative, self-satisfy-ing respectability that seems likely to remain his eternal characteristic.

In full justice it cannot be said that Geneva has ever given anything but a welcome, sincere if not effusive, to the incoming stranger. It mattered not whether he bore merchandise or ideas. Centuries before a League of Nations, .Geneva had drawn to itself a cosmopolitan atmosphere as the middle point of an international trade route that coursed from Italy to France and Northern Europe. Even so, there remained the national consciousness that has remained so distinctly Genevese. This intensity of national pride has increased so much that even to-day, over a hundred years from the time that Geneva became a part of the Swiss Confederation, there is far more consciousness of Genevese citizenship than of Swiss. The ages of struggle against French, German and Italian oppression have left their indelible mark on the citizenry; one has only to witness the enthusiasm of celebrating the Escalade on every December 10, commemorating the famous repulse of the Duke of Savoy, to comprehend the depths of Genevese patriotism. It is notable that the last anniversary, the 325th, surpassed all others in brilliancy and magnitude of preparation. | From its earliest beginnings, Geneva j appears to have been destined to a role j sombre, quiet, unique. The influence

of Calvin and the Reformation has left upon it a mark of severity and austereness that the modern trend is unable to efface. It is not difficult to see whereby, with a background that was as intellectually progressive as it was emotionally cold, the modem city has become a veritable haven for institutions whose purposes and characteristics are quite as serious as those of their eminently respectable host. The actual launching of a world organisation from its Geneva headquarters did not take place until 1864. In that year a group of local citizens became actively engaged in whaf was to become the Red Cross. A uniform basis of principles for this first great international undertaking was drawn up, and the fact that to-day the Red Cross insignia is the inverted Sw'ias coat of arms, pays significant tribute to the enthusiasm of its Swiss founders, while the choice of the city as permanent headquarters for the International Red Cross attests to the prestige of the local citizenry for their part in the affair. Of still greater interest to Americans is the role that Geneva played when America and England concluded amicably the first great arbitration award of history. The famous Alabama Commission, finishing its work in 1872, signed the document awarding claims to the United States in the identical room in Geneva’s Hotel de Ville in which the Red Cross began its history. Since christened the Salle de I’Alabama, this room stands as an impressive memorial to tw r o important historical events which, in the opinion of many, laid the immediate foundations for a League of Nations. As Reginald Wright Kaufmann, the American author, has recently written: “WThat may eventually come out oi the League of Nations and Locarno few will prophesy; but it is safe for any man to say that, had there been no Alabama Commission in 1872, there would have been no disarmament dream of Russia’s Nicholas IL, no Hague Tribunal, no Locarno Conference in 1925, no League to-day. From the quiet settlement of that AmericanEnglish dispute much has already arisen. Every one of our toe rare triumphs of arbitration over threatß of armed conflict is indebted to the example set in the Salle de l’Alabama of Geneva’s Hotel de Ville.” The exact manner in which it was finally determined that the League of Nations should be brought to Geneva has never been definitely €/ plained. Certain it is that the city's central location, state of neutrality during the war, and freedom from influence by a Central Government (Berne is the capital of the Swiss Confederation) gave Geneva a marked advantage over Paris and Brussels, the other sites considered in the stress of the Peace Conference. Economically there has been jj radical change in Geneva since tne war. If there is a difference, it one of quantity. More watches ar sold, more food is bought, more

are occupied; the old industries ha expanded rather than given new. But it is still to be noticed the present prosperity is taken up - much with paying the huge uati debt incurred during the war as with buying more automobiles. - it is the bicycle, From venerable bank presidents t ' to the poorest of street ganu » t ,,. | city’s pedalling propensities s i limited.