There seems good ground for the belief that there has been a real growth among the civilized nations of a sentiment which will permit a gradual substitution of other methods than the method of war in the settlement of disputes.  It is not pretended that as yet we are near a position in which it will be possible wholly to prevent war, or that a just regard for national interest and honor will in all cases permit of the settlement of international disputes by arbitration; but by a mixture of prudence and firmness with wisdom we think it is possible to do away with much of the provocation and excuse for war, and at least in many cases to substitute some other and more rational method for the settlement of disputes.  The Hague Court offers so good an example of what can be done in the direction of such settlement that it should be encouraged in every way.

Further steps should be taken.  In President McKinley’s annual Message of December 5, 1898, he made the following recommendation: 

“The experiences of the last year bring forcibly home to us a sense of the burdens and the waste of war.  We desire in common with most civilized nations, to reduce to the lowest possible point the damage sustained in time of war by peaceable trade and commerce.  It is true we may suffer in such cases less than other communities, but all nations are damaged more or less by the state of uneasiness and apprehension into which an outbreak of hostilities throws the entire commercial world.  It should be our object, therefore, to minimize, so far as practicable, this inevitable loss and disturbance.  This purpose can probably best be accomplished by an international agreement to regard all private property at sea as exempt from capture or destruction by the forces of belligerent powers.  The United States Government has for many years advocated this humane and beneficent principle, and is now in a position to recommend it to other powers without the imputation of selfish motives.  I therefore suggest for your consideration that the Executive be authorized to correspond with the governments of the principal maritime powers with a view of incorporating into the permanent law of civilized nations the principle of the exemption of all private property at sea, not contraband of war, from capture or destruction by belligerent powers.”

I cordially renew this recommendation.

The Supreme Court, speaking on December 11. 1899, through Peckham, J., said: 

“It is, we think, historically accurate to say that this Government has always been, in its views, among the most advanced of the governments of the world in favor of mitigating, as to all non-combatants, the hardships and horrors of war.  To accomplish that object it has always advocated those rules which would in most cases do away with the right to capture the private property of an enemy on the high seas.”