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International Law and Guilt by Association

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2017

Quincy Wright
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Type
Editorial Comment
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 43 , Issue 4 , October 1949 , pp. 746 - 755
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 1949

References

1 This is a common practice in French courts. See The Affair of St. Cyr in Stephen, James Fitzjames, A General View of the Criminal Law of England (London, 1863), pp. 457–458 Google Scholar.

2 Shaw, C. J., in Commonwealth U. Webster, 5 Cush. (Mass.) 325 (1849) ; Bouvier, Law Dictionary, “Character.” “A man’s general bad character is a weak reason for believing that he was concerned in any particular criminal transaction, for it is a circumstance common to him and hundreds and thousands of other people.” Stephen, op. cit., p. 309.

3 Stephen, op. cit., p. 303; Kirchwey, G. W., “Criminal Law,” Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Vol. 4, p. 571 Google Scholar.

4 Shaw, C. J., in Commonwealth U. Hunt, 4 Met. (Mass.) 116 (1842) ; Fuller, C. J., in Pettibone v. U. S., 148 U. S. 203 (1892); Stephen, op. cit., pp. 62, 148; Sayre, F. B., “Conspiracy,” Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Vol. 4, p. 237 Google Scholar; Bouvier, op. cit., “Conspiracy.”

5 U. S. Criminal Code, sec. 37 ; U.S.C.A., Tit. 18, sec. 88.

6 O’Brian, John Lord, “Loyalty Tests and Guilt by Association,” Harvard Law Review, Vol. 61, No. 4 (1948), p. 592 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Levi, Edward, Nathanson, Nathaniel and Sharp, Malcolm, “Guilt by Association,” University of Chicago Round Table, March 13, 1948 Google Scholar.

7 Kirchwey, op. cit., Vol. 4, p. 570.

8 Salmond, J. W., Jurisprudence (London, 1902), pp. 353 Google Scholar ff.

9 Radcliffe-Brown, A. R., “Law, Primitive,” Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Vol. 9, p. 204 Google Scholar; Salmond, op. cit., p. 70; below, note 39.

10 Proceedings of the American Society of International Law, 1946, p. 106. See also Wright, Q., A Study of War (Chicago, 1942), pp. 913–914 Google Scholar.

11 Levi et al., op. cit., p. 2.

12 Borchard, E. M., Diplomatic Protection of Citizens Abroad (New York, 1919), p. 34 Google Scholar.

13 Nussbaum, Arthur, A Concise History of the Law of Nations (New York, 1947), p. 34 Google Scholar.

14 2 Wall. 409, 419-420. The court noted the development of an immunity for enemy property on land but held, since “the rebels regard it (cotton) as one of their main sinews of war,” the “capture was justified by legislation as well as public policy.”

15 Borchard, op. cit., pp. 33-36.

16 Grotius, De Jure Belli ac Pacis (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1925), Bk. Ill, Ch. lv, pp. 643-648.

17 Ibid., Bk. III, Ch. xi, sec. ii, p. 723. Grotius cites Victoria, De Jure Belli (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1917), pars. 36, 45, pp. 179,182, on this point.

18 Grotius, op. cit., Bk. III, Chs. xi, xii, pp. 722 ff., 745 ff.

19 Ibid., Bk. III, Ch. x, pp. 718-721.

20 Hague Convention IV (1907); Garner, , International Law and the World War (London, 1920), pp. 66–59 Google Scholar.

21 Hague Contention IV (1907), Art. 50.

22 Garner, op. cit., p. 501 ; Wright, Q., “The Effect of the War on International Law—War and Neutrality,” Minnesota Law Review, Vol. 5 (June, 1921), pp. 515 ff.Google Scholar; Fenwick, C. G., International Law (3rd ed., 1948), pp. 549 ff.Google Scholar

23 Grotius, op. cit., Bk. II, Ch. xxi, see. xii ; Bk. III, Ch. xi, sec. ii, pp. 539, 723.

24 Ibid., Bk. II, Ch. xxi, sec. xvii, p. 543.

25 Ibid., Bk. III, Ch. ii, sec. ii, pp. 624, 627.

26 Ibid., Bk. II, Ch. xxi, secs. vii-x, pp. 534-537.

27 De Jure Belli (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1933), Bk. III, Ch. viii, pp. 322-327.

28 U. S. Department of State, The Treaty of Versailles and After (Denys P. Myers, ed., Washington, 1947), pp. 413 ff.; Baruch, Bernard M., The Making of the Separation and Economic Sections of the Treaty (New York, 1920), pp. 19 ffGoogle Scholar.

29 Treaty of Peace with Italy, Feb. 10, 1947, Art. 74, does not specify reasons for the reparations, but the clauses in the peace treaties with Bulgaria (Art. 21), Hungary (Art. 23), Rumania (Art. 22), and Finland (Art. 23) state that reparations are to compensate the recipients for losses resulting from military operations and occupations of the payer. The report of the Potsdam Conference, Aug. 2, 1945, sec. IV, Reparations, recognized it as just that Germany “make compensation for damages “which she had caused to the allied nations. See also Byrnes, James P., Speaking Frankly (New York, 1947), pp. 26–29, 136Google Scholar.

30 This Declaration forbids distinction in rights because of race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status, or because of the political, jurisdictional, or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs (Art. 2) ; assures equal protection of the laws to all (Art. 7) ; requires presumption of innocence until found guilty, and fair trial in criminal trials; forbids criminal liability under ex post facto laws (Art. 11) ; and guarantees freedom of opinion and expression (Art. 19) and the right of peaceful assembly and association (Art. 20). United Nations Bulletin, Jan. 1, 1949, Vol. 6, p. 6; this Journal, Supp., Vol. 43 (1949), p. 127.

31 Wright, Q., “War Criminals,” this Journal, Vol. 39 (April, 1945), pp. 275–285 Google Scholar; “The Law of the Nuremberg Trial,” ibid., Vol. 41 (Jan., 1947), pp. 55-58. The constitutional authority of Congress to define and punish offenses against the law of nations assumes the existence of such offenses in customary or conventional international law. U. S. v. Arjona, 120 U. S. 479 (1887).

32 Grotius, op. cit., Bk. II, Ch. xx, sec. xxxviii ; Bk. III, Ch. xi, secs. v ff., pp. 502 ff., 729 ff.; Gentili, op. cit., Ch. viii, p. 323.

33 Grotius and Gentili cite a number of cases (above, note 32). See also Levy, Albert, “Criminal Responsibility of Individuals and International Law,” University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 12 (1945), p. 319 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Wright, Q., “The Law of the Nuremberg Trial,” this Journal, Vol. 41 (Jan., 1947), p. 63 Google Scholar.

34 Trial of Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal (Nuremberg, 1947), Vol. 1, p. 223.

35 Ibid., Vol. 3, pp. 104-105.

36 Ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 146-150.

37 Ibid., Vol. 1, pp. 220, 223.

38 Ibid., Vol. 1, p. 256. The Tribunal pointed out that on this matter it exercised judicial discretion “in accordance with well settled legal principles, one of the most important of which is that criminal guilt is personal and that mass punishment should be avoided. ‘

39 See Salmond, op. cit., p. 394, who, however, distinguishes not only civil from criminal liability, but also remedial from penal liability in view of the occasional imposition of punitive damages or “penal liability” in civil proceedings.

40 Harvard Research Draft Convention on Responsibility of States, Art. 1, this Journal, Supp., Vol. 23 (1929), p. 140; Whiteman, Marjorie, Damages in International Law (Washington, 1937), Vol. 1, pp. 710 ff.Google Scholar; Vol. 3, p. 1874; Wharton, Criminal Law, sec. 91; Hudson, M. O., International Tribunals (Washington, 1944), p. 180 Google Scholar; Wright, A Study of War, pp. 911-915.

41 Grotius justified war to punish a criminal state (above, note 26), and the system of sanctions provided in the League of Nations Covenant (Art. 16) was cited by the British prosecution in the Nuremberg trial as a recognition that states might be penally liable. Elsewhere this sanctioning procedure has been interpreted as preventive rather than as penal. The sanctions provisions of the United Nations Charter have “the object of maintaining or restoring international peace and security” and emphasize preventive action (see Art. 40). They also permit the target of police action to be a government or individuals rather than the state as such (see Arts. 39, 41, 42). See also Wright, A Study of War, pp. 911-915, 939-944, 1071-1074.

42 United Nations Charter, Preamble.