Our Daily News Letter

(By Our Geneva Correspondent)

The idea of creating in the League of Nations a Permanent Minorities Commission to deal with the minorities in a similar way as the Permanent Mandates Commission deals with the mandates established since the war was discussed here at the last session of the League Council. If this idea is realized it will mean the fulfillment of one of the lofty ideals raised by Wilson in the World War, the ideal of fair and just treatment and the proper protection of the rights of all national and racial groups. The Permanent Minorities Commission and the Permanent Mandates Commission would constitute the two greatest achievements of the League of Nations.

The suggestion of a Permanent Minorities Commission was first made by the Dutch Senator, Baron von Hoogland, at the last meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Conference and was brought up before the Council by M. de Mello Franco, Brazil’s representative on the League, in his report on the protection of minorities.

M. de Mello Franco, reviewing his study of the question of the protection of minorities and quoting a number of opinions and suggestions on the subject, observed:

“In order to attain the desired ideal, it would suffice that the Governments should never depart from the rules of good faith, and that the League of Nations should exercise its legitimate supervision; also that the persons belonging to the minorities should willingly fulfill their duty to cooperate; as loyal citizens, with the State whose nationals they have become.

“The Hungarian delegate also made proposals in favor of an automatic resort to the Permanent Court of International Justice whenever a question of law arose; that is, in the present instance, whenever a complaint was made against the infraction or danger of infraction of the provisions of the Minorities Treaties.

“This problem has been the subject of discussion in the Press, in the fourth Assembly of the League of Nations, and in Inter-Parliamentary conferences.

“If we refer to the strict letter of the treaties in force, we shall see that it would not be easy to bring the formula suggested by the Hungarian delegate within its terms. In conformity with this formula, the head organizations of the churches and educational and economic institutions of the countries which have accepted the obligations laid down in the Minorities Treaties would have the right to draw the attention of the Council to any infraction or danger of infraction of any one of the obligations of international interest concerning race, language or religion, and the Council would be obliged automatically to receive without further examination petitions coming from these organizations and institutions. We have seen, however, that all existing treaties without exception grant only to the Members of the Council of the League of Nations the right of drawing the attention of the Council to the infraction or danger of infraction of any of these obligations.

“If the Treaties have not granted even to the State Members of the League which do not sit on the Council the right to draw the attention of the Council to an infraction or danger of infraction of the provisions of the Treaties on Minorities how is it possible to admit the possibility of granting, by means of the interpretation of the clauses of these Treaties, as similar right to churches or educational or economic institutions, however great the respect which may be due to them?

“If we consider the practical side of the question, it will be perceived that it would not be wise in the interests of the minorities themselves for the petitions under discussion to be automatically submitted to examination by the Council, and made the subject of debate in that body before a thorough study of the circumtances to which attention is drawn and the documents on which the petitions are usually based. Senator van Hoogland proposed at the last meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Conference that the Conference should suggest to the Council the institution of a permanent Minorities Commission which should be entrusted with preparing and sifting the work of the Council of the League of Nations by making an investigation into any claims presented by freely checking the facts which were alleged before these matters were taken up by the Council itself.

“The duties which would be entrusted to this Commission would be the same as those which in conformity with the procedure of the Council are at present performed by the Committee of Three with the effective assistance of the Minorities Section directed by an expert whose capacity both intellectually and morally is universally recognized.”

M. Benes (Czecho-Slovakia) commented on the report, saying that he had himself followed this question of minorities from the outset. After the war, he had taken part in the discussions of the Paris Conference to which M. de Mello Franco had alluded when the question had arisen of signing the Minorities Treaty. The account given by M. de Mello Franco of this event corresponded exactly with the reality. M. Benes had also participated in all the Assemblies and in the discussions concerning minorities questions.

He had recently had occasion in London to assist at a conference on the question of minorities, and he had reached the same conclusions as M. de Mello Franco. “It was necessary that nations possessing minorities should respect the rights of these minorities, but it was also necessary for the minorities to realize that, if they went too far, the consequences might be deplorable and quite contrary to the wishes of all those who had originated the minorities treaties,” he declared.