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A Study of the Theory and Practice of

Plebiscites

HISTORICAL SUMMARY

Discussion of the doctrine of national self-determination falls naturally into three periods. At least this is true when the discussion, as in this volume, deals exclusively with national self-determination as a factor in changes of sovereignty through separation, cession and annexation.

The history of the doctrine properly begins with the French Revolution. Born of the political principles and practical problems of the Revolution, the doctrine was adopted as the guiding principle in foreign relations, was applied in good faith in the annexations of Avignon, Savoy, Nice, and used as a political subterfuge in the later annexations of the Belgian Communes and the Rhine Valley, only to be utterly destroyed by the growing ambition for conquest over a world of enemies.

The next and most prosperous period of its history is from 1848 to 1870. Revived by the national aspirations for self-government in 1848; resorted to by the Italian patriots; adopted as their own by Prussia and the Germanic Confederation as the solution for the Schleswig question; adopted by the Congress of Paris of 1856, it grew rapidly in prestige and by 1859 had enlisted the almost undeviating adherence of three of the four leading statesmen of the time - Cavour, Russell and Napoleon and the temporary support of Bismarck. Recognized as the creative force of the new Italian kingdom; made the basis of the union of Tuscany, Emilia, Sicily, Naples, the Marches, and Umbria; repeated in the subsequent union of Venetia and Rome; stipulated in the treaty of Turin for the cession of Savoy; endorsed, though unsuccessfully, by the chief Powers at the Conference of London as the only solution for the Schleswig question; followed by Great Britain in her cession of the Ionian Islands to Greece; inserted in the treaty of Prague between Austria and Prussia- by 1866 the method of appeal to a vote of the inhabitants, either by plebiscite or by representative assemblies, especially elected, bade fair to establish itself as a custom amounting to law. Another philosophy was rising, however. The Prussian annexation of Schleswig in 1867, without regard to the provisions of the treaty of Prague and the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine in 1871 dealt the principle a blow which, the world being under German tutelage in matters of historical criticism and the

philosophy of the State, was practically fatal. After 1870 it was given a nebulous continuance by the treaty of 1877 between France and Sweden for the cession of St. Bartholomew, and by the treaty of Ancon between Chile and Peru. The ascendancy of the doctrine of political opportunism, however, found accurate expression in the Congress of Berlin. A second Congress of Vienna, it was to have the same result, for the doctrine of national selfdetermination, abandoned by diplomats, was to have henceforth a place in the platform of every liberal or radical movement and with the outbreak of the war in 1914 was to become the symbol of regeneration for every subject nationality.

The doctrine of national self-determination is based on and inseparable from that of popular sovereignty. Before the French Revolution sovereignty looked to the land, not to the inhabitants. Change of sovereignty through inheritance or marriage of the reigning prince, through barter or through conquest was the recognized and legitimate order. Title so acquired was admittedly valid without appeal to the will of the inhabitants.

To the philosophers of the French Revolution the right of conquest, reasonable adjunct as it was of the divine right of kings, was incompatible with the right of peoples to choose their own rulers. To assert that a conqueror could retain his domination over the inhabitants of a conquered territory against their will was to deny the doctrine of popular sovereignty and to change free men back to slaves. In order to harmonize external relations with the basic principles of the new order the doctrine of no annexation without consultation of the inhabitants was formulated, a doctrine new in the experience of Europe. Yet as no new doctrine of political philosophy springs full grown upon a startled world, but always, after the event, seeds of it may be found in the words of men of thought and may be discerned in events long antedating its period of maturity, so it is true in this instance that writers had indicated the principle, subjects had appealed to it, and a few astute rulers had made use of it before the final adoption as a national policy by leaders of the French Revolution.

Historians in discussing the origins of the doctrine refer to the case of the provinces ceded by Louis IX to Henry III of England in the thirteenth century, against which cession the nobles of the provinces in question protested as contrary to their rights,1 and also to the refusal of the people of Guienne. to be separated from the kingdom of England, notwithstanding the grant and donation of Richard the Second. However significant these instances may be, there is far greater importance in the attack on title by conquest and the ridi

1 L. E. A. D. H. de la Guéronnière, Le droit public et l'Europe moderne, vol. 1, p. 434. 2 Samuel von Pufendorf, De jure naturae et gentium, lib. 3, pp. 809, 831, citing Froissard, 1.4. Polyd. Virgil. Hist. Angl. 1.20.