Ii Analysis of the Treaty - league, international, france, germany and art

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II. ANALYSIS OF THE TREATY Part I. The Covenant.—Part I deals with the Covenant of the League of Nations (see COVENANT). It may be here remarked that the Covenant united all its members in a league guaranteeing their territorial independence and integrity. The entrance of Ger many into the League was deprecated at the time by some of the Allies and only became a certainty after the signature of the agree ments of Locarno on Dec. 1, 1925, and their ratification in 1926. The most important powers granted to the League are the super vision of mandated territories (Art. 22), whereby the future gov ernment of the German colonies, after having been assigned to various mandatory Powers, is subject to supervision by the Per manent Mandates' Commission. This is appointed by the League, and it inspects the annual reports of the mandatory Powers on the territory, committed to their charge.

Similarly, the racial and religious Minorities' Treaties have been placed under the guard6.nship of the League, but their supervision here, though real, is not so effective as over territories under the mandates. Ultimately the supervision of disarmament, as pro vided in the German treaty, was to fall into the hands of the League, and this was finally accomplished by the dissolution of the inter-Allied naval and military commissions and their supersession by the League at the end of 1925. The international control of health and disease is provided for in Article 25 and has been actu ally much extended since. Article 23 provides for international co-operation in labour questions (see below, Part XIII).

The most binding obligation of the League is found in Articles 12-16, by which members bound themselves not to go to war in disregard of its covenants until three months of arbitration or in quiry by the council had elapsed. It is provided under Article 8 that the League shall formulate plans for reduction of national armaments, and it took the lead in the disarmament conference opened in 1926.

The actual machinery, through which the League functions, consisted at the outset of a council of nine, of whom five were to be France, Great Britain, Italy, Japan and the United States. As the latter declined to accede, five out of the original nine seats were left to be filled by smaller States, whose representatives are elected by the Assembly of the League. Germany in 1926 entered

the League, and occupied a permanent seat on the Council until 1933. The Assembly consists of representatives of all member States, and is an annual international parliament. Two institutions connected with, but actually separated from, the League are the Permanent Court of International Justice (provided for under Art. 14 and actually functioning since 1921), and the International Labour Office and annual conference (Art. 23-4). The League also, as will be described below, was the governor of two important pieces of territory, the Saar basin and the free city of Danzig.

Parts II

and III. Territorial Western Frontiers.—Germany lost territory in the south, north and east as a result of the War, whilst other arrangements tended to weaken her influence beyond her own borders. Belgium, for example, ceased by Article 31 to be a neutralized State, and later entered into a military alliance with France. She also acquired by cession from Germany the frontier districts of Moresnet, Eupen, and Malmedy (Art. 32-4) ; Luxembourg similarly ceased to be a neutralized State (Art. 4o-1), and later entered into an economic union with Belgium. By Articles 42-4 the whole left bank of the Rhine and the right bank to the west of a line drawn sokm. to the east of the Rhine, was to be demilitarized forever. Fortifications were to be dismantled there, and no permanent works for manoeuvre or mobilization were to be permitted.

By Articles 45-50 the Saar basin formed an area under the con trol of an international commission and of the League, and its coal-mines were ceded to France. At the end of 15 years a plebi scite was to be taken, whereby the inhabitants would vote as to their preference (a) for the existing international regime, (b) for union with France, (c) for union with Germany. Finally, and most important of all, by Articles 51-79, Alsace and Lorraine were ceded by Germany to France. The latter thus gained nearly 2,000, 00o inhabitants, great strategic advantages, iron and other valuable minerals. The Saar voted in 1935 to return to Germany.