This draft of the treaty was communicated to the Powers, who made known their answer in 1924. Eighteen among them gave it their adhesion in principle, but on the whole, it was plain that it would not be favourably received. The British Government espe cially, through Ramsay MacDonald, raised numerous objections. The guarantees suggested did not seem to him to imply strictly the reduction of armaments : the judicial guarantees, such as the acceptance of arbitration or the jurisdiction of the international court of justice, appeared to be left on one side; the particular agreements recalled the system of alliances; lastly, the rule of unanimity in the decisions of the Council would paralyse its action in determining the aggressor, and indefinitely delay its interven tion. These criticisms carried great weight, and the projected treaty of mutual assistance was abandoned.
The Geneva Protocol.—When, in Sept. 1924, the League of Nations Assembly met, for the fifth time, it found itself there fore once more faced with a check. Nevertheless, some light re sulted from the very objections which had been made to its pre vious decisions; it did not abandon the great object which it had in view-security and the limitation of armaments.
Ramsay MacDonald supported the cause of arbitration; he refused to consider anything beyond it. "Our interests," he said, "our interests for peace are far greater than our interests in creating a machinery of defence. A machinery of defence is easy to create but beware lest in creating it you destroy the chances of peace. The League of Nations has to advance the interests of peace. The world has to be habituated to our existence ; the world has to be habituated to our influence; we have to embody into the world confidence in the order and rectitude of law, and then nations-with the League of Nations enjoying the authority, with the League of Nations looked up to, not because its arm is great but because its mind is calm and its nature just-can pursue their destinies with a feeling of perfect security, none daring to make them afraid." Ramsay MacDonald placed confidence in hu man nature. He forgot Pascal's words, that justice without force is powerless, that one must bring justice and force together, and so act that what is just may also be strong.
M. Herriot answered that arbitration was necessary, but that it was not sufficient ; that it was a means and not an end. He added that the three terms-arbitration, security, disarmament went together, but that they would be vain abstractions if they did not rest upon living realities.
Agreement was reached in the course of the session. On Oct. 2, the Assembly voted the Protocol of Geneva. While M. Politis, the Greek delegate presented to the Assembly the report upon arbitration, M. Benei submitted to it his report on security and the reduction of armaments. In the event of aggression, all the signatories of the Protocol were loyally to apply the sanctions provided against the aggressor. As to the particular agreements, they could only come into play when the Council had addressed its behests to the signatory States. Lastly, as in the eyes of M. Benei, there could be no arbitration and security without dis armament, nor disarmament without arbitration and security, the signatories of the Protocol were to take part in an international conference for the reduction of armaments, which was to meet June 25, 1925. On Oct. 3, the Assembly elected a committee charged with preparing the work of this conference.
In the midst of this, the British parliament was dissolved and another Government took the direction of affairs. The new secretary of State for foreign affairs, Austen (afterwards Sir Austen) Chamberlain, asked for the adjournment of the Disarm ament Conference and on March 12, 1925, on the re-assembly of the Council of the League of Nations, he made it known that his Government rejected the Geneva Protocol, and gave the rea sons for this.
While acknowledging the aspirations of the authors of this Protocol, it seemed to him that the responsibilities already assumed by the members of the League of Nations were gravely increased by it; the absence from the League of Nations of pow erful economic Powers, such as the United States, was calculated to modify the point of view from which the authors of the Cov enant had considered economic sanctions. Chamberlain added that it might be imprudent to forbid a State threatened by one of its neighbours from proceeding with defensive preparations. Es pecially from a naval point of view, it was impossible to force a Government to leave its ships dispersed in every ocean, as they may find themselves in time of peace. Lastly, the arrangements of the Protocol appeared to him too absolute; and he ended by suggesting the idea that the nations whose differences might cause the renewal of conflicts, should bind themselves by special agree ments, conceived in the spirit of the Covenant and carried out in close harmony with the League of Nations.