It is an especial privilege to appear before the members of the Council of Foreign Relations because of their notable endeavor to facilitate an intelligent appreciation by our people of policies and action in the field of foreign affairs. Not only have you provided a forum but in-establishing a quarterly review under highly competent direction you have made one of the most helpful contributions to a better understanding of foreign relations than has ever been made by private enterprise. The need is obvious.

For a long time writers on international law took it for granted that the subject of their studies was a relatively recent product of modern civilization, and that the ancient world did not know any system of international law. If we go back to the literature of the nineteenth century, we can find a certain feeling of pride among internationalists that international law was one of the best fruits of our civilization and that it was a system which distinguished us from the ancient barbarians. Some of these writers paid special attention to this question of origins and endeavored to explain why the ancient world never could have had any international law.

There are certain preliminary observations which should be made before we can take up the question of codifying international law or the method of codification, for without a correct understanding of certain matters, which may be considered fundamental, we may not know whether we are to deal with a system of law or a system of philosophy. As a matter of fact we are dealing with both, for law develops unconsciously or consciously in accordance with the principles of philosophy. If the law of nations is to be considered law in the strict sense of the word, we must deal with it as a system of law. If, on the other hand, it is a system of philosophy rather than of law, we must deal with it as philosophy, and the point of approach and the method of treatment will be different. But, above and beyond law, we are dealing with justice, and with those principles of justice, which, expressed in rules of law, we call the law of nations. Justice is the source; the principles of justice applicable to the conduct of nations constitute the law of nations, and the rules of law based upon these principles change with conditions, or to meet new conditions, and form the body and substance of international law at any given period.

Congressman Porters resolution of January 28, 1924,1 authorizing an appropriation for American participation in two international conferences on the opium and narcotic drug traffic to be held in the latter part of this year is the most recent step in the long history of mankind's fight against his own desire for narcotics. This fight has progressed by three stages.

The Netherland-America Foundation, an organization composed of Americans of Dutch descent, of Hollanders residing in the United States, and of all those interested in furthering friendship between this country and the Netherlands, has announced the initiation of a Grotius Memorial Fund for the purpose of presenting a memorial window to the Nieuwe Kerk at Delft, Holland, where Grotius lies buried. The presentation will take place in 1925 in commemoration of the three hundredth anniversary of the publication of the De Jure Belli ac Pads by the “Father of International Law.” The suggestion has received the approval of the Dutch Government and is endorsed by Chief Justice Taft and other persons prominent in the American legal profession.

The Thirty-third Conference of the International Law Association will open on Monday, September 8, 1924, at Stockholm. The subjects for discussion will include the proposed statute of a Permanent International Criminal Court and reports of the Committees on General Average, Foreign Judgments, Systems of Evidence, Codification, Nationality, Commercial Arbitration, Neutrality, and Aviation.