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JAPAN AND KOREA.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
INTERNATIONAL LAW.
(July 27, 1907.
Koreans as well as any Power would, and questions could be referred. Each man was certainly better and more wisely than the of necessity a law unto himself; and these present Dynasty has done. one of the Imperialistic patious is in a symptoms of a growing want. That the Besides, not knightly courts of reference were the first position to throw stones at Japan if she privileged order, cach one of whom indivi carries matters in the Peninsula with dually had sword on his admission to defend rather a high hand-self interest demands the right, should be willing to refer its that there shall be no shilly-shallying, and rules to a tribunal, even of his own choice, Japan's interests there are not those of mere aggrandizement, but of self-preserva law and order; and these knightly courts, was a long step towards the realisation of tiou, than which there is scarcely a higher though absolutely wanting any power of law for nations. Our Tokyo correspondent enforcing their decrees, were yet the fore- hints at further steps to a solution being regarded as necessary, and there is just the Justice. In not a few particulars, especially Tuuners of legally constituted Courts of possibility that he has heard of something in its utter incapacity to enforce its decrees, on the lines we have been indicating. If and in its avowed incapacity to take into our guess turn out to be a fair one, we d|con-ideration mere questions of rig it or not think even Messrs. HULBERT and com. wrong, does this Convention of the Hague re- pany can honestly express surprise. There semble the old Courts of Honour, and it can will very likely be on their part an out-readily be seen that this incapacity arises burst of virtuous indignation, but after all, from the inherent weakness of the system. it may be reflected, they have had their As long, indeed, as it continues to be the share in helping the Korean Dynasty to its unwritten common law of the world, that present fall.
each nation must continue to be its own arbiter in matters of right and wrong, so long will it be impossible to bring inter- national questions before any tribunal as abstract matters of justice or injustice; and in is best that it should be so. Unhappily the our present stage of civilisation it points of dispute between nations at present possible are sufficiently numerous to keep the world at large in a state of continual ferment, from which day by day it requir.s the exercise of the highest discretion to avoid small differences of opinion becoming the forerunners of mighty wars. Were the abstract enquiry of the justice as between mau and mau of every or auy act of aggres- sion to be in addition submitted to the intermeddling of aliens, it would be certain that the subjects of friction would be vastly increased in number as well as in virulence. As a matter of national existence Japan found it necessary some three or four years the correctness of the judgment except ago to occupy Korea. Who is to judge of
Later on for the same Japan herself? Who is to supersede her judgment? It reason she found it necessary to stay there.
liable to error, but would it be better if may be wrong; all human judgments are half a dozen nations, each accustomed to look upon the affair in a different light,
(Daily Press, July 23rd.) It is a somewhat common belief amongst many not versed in what is styled Inter- national Law, that the Hague Conference sits as a court of justice to decide what is right, and what wrong between nations Nothing, of course, could he further from its purpose, which is merely to preside generally as a court of custom, and arrange in advance what is the correct thing to do in accordance with international etiquette in certain eventualities : whether for example, it is quite the correct thing to pitch into your enemy before you have sent him a formal note declaring you are at war, or what is the particular way in which you should treat a Geneva Cross, or what kinds of tips a gentlemanly nation should carry on its bullets. In fact the nearest approach in practice to the Convention is the old "Court of Honour" which in the
(Daily Press, 22nd July). Our Tokyo correspondent ha! prepared our readers for interesting developments of the Korean situation, which had completely ousted discussion of Japanese relations with America from its prominent position in the papers. Nothing could be of greater importance to the Japanese, save, perhaps, some imitation of the Commodore PERRY incident. The telegram which we published in our Saturday morning Extra," and -the subsequent message which appears with it in this issue, is very interesting ind-ed, and may have surprised the Japanese as much as it has surprised foreign observers. In view of all the incidents leading up to the present crisis, which have been narrated in our columns and commented upon, the action of the Emperor is perhaps not to be wondered at. His Ministers, bhaving not long ago been selected by Marquis Iro to replace the old, corrupt gang, would Daturally be suspected by some people of having acted under the inspiration of the Resident-General, and to those who refuse to believe anything good of the Japanese, our correspondent's last dispatch will be suggestive of the excuse that accuses, as in the shrewd French adage. We do not think there has been anything of the sort, however. The mere abdication of the Soul puppet is hardly likely to be considered in Tokyo as a sufficient safeguard against further intrigues of the brazen sort just come to light. It was characteristically Korean of the Emperor, whose faults had been found out, and who was waiting for no one knew what punishment, to nominate his successor at the moment of resigning. Of course the nominee was the obvious one, aut there is nothing much to cavil at as unreason able in the Emperor resiguing "in favour of the Crown Prince;" but if the situation be regarded through the eyes of Marquis Iro and his Government, there appears a cer- tain colour of injpudence in the assumption that there would be any successor at all. The Japanese might have been considering that very question. The deposition of the Emperor as in the air, and it is possible that the Powers were being diplomatically sounded as to their views-whether a successor of the blood royal, or a Japanese regency. This, we admit, is only a guess, but it would be such an effective solution of the Korean problem, with all its anomalies and possibilities of trouble under the late régime, that we should be surprised if it had not at least entered the mind of the Japanese Government. Moreover, although some Power or Powers might protest for- mally, or to exact some quid pro quo, it is unlikely that the rest of the Governments would be greatly perturbed by such an issue. The pre-eminent importance of Korea to Japan has been admitted, and the result of the war made the arrangement of 1905 a matter to be viewed with surprising equanimity by the Powers. It left future relations very much to be settled be tween Japan and Korea; and the suicidal mission to the Hague was so flagrantly in defiance of the Convention giving Japan control of Korea's foreign relations that it would seem political bad taste to meddle with Japan's management of the exceedingly awkward situation. With or without a Korean ruler, there will be practically little difference between the status of Japan in Korea, and the status of Russia in Poland, America in the Philippines, or When as
yet justice was in its infancy Great Britain in Egypt or even India. and courts of law, under trained judges People who caunot govern themselves pro-accustomed to try the issues of right perly lose their title to national indepen. and wrong, were not ret constituted, there dence, and Japan is likely to govern the was no supreme authority to which these
days of Chivalry used to decide on points concerning the knightly duty of a cavalier, but were in no way meant as courts of con- science to decide the rights and wrongs of the various champions. How a knight carried his lance, and how he wore his shield of arms; when he could make an apology without derogation to his knightly honour; whether, when he tendered it, it was sufficient from the same point of view, and whether acting on this finding the Court was in a position to use its influence to bring about a reconciliation between the parties without derogating its own houou- and dignity; hese, and n t mere questions of right or wrong, or matters of conscience as between man and man, were the sole points which the Court according to i's constitution was entiled to take into consideration. Nor WAS there anything wrong or unjust in this, for in those times, and according to the prevailing feeling of the day, which was preeminently a religious one, might was the true arbitrament of wrong or right, for the Almighty was supposed to give the victory to the one in the right. Hence, of course. the right of appeal to combat, and the ordeal, the issues of either of which, as determined by God, took a far higher posi- tion than the mere decisions of a human court with all its human weaknesses and liability to error.
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were to interfere? Would not the most
general fall-to all round? likely conclusion of such a course be a
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On the whole the best way to preserve peace under such conditions as prevail is for each nation to mind its own business. The acknowledgment is doubtless rather derogatory to
our civilisation; but practical statesmen we must accept the position, and wait till some signs of a new dispensation appear on the horizon before agitating for a new heaven and a new earth to relieve our grievances.
SUBSIDIARY COINAGE LOSSES.
(Daily Press, 24th July.) Yesterday the members of the Legislative Council had submitted to them the corres- pondence on the subject of Hongkong and Cantonese subsidiary coins. Some of it has already been published, but the subject is of such urgent and vital interest that the public will probably bear with a little repetition rather than miss any item of information bearing upon it. The first item of the correspondence is a
+4 con- fidential" letter dated Government House, July 23rd, 1906, a idressed by Sir Matthew NATHAN as Governor to the Earl of ELGIN as Secretary of State for the Colonies. follows previous correspondence on the subject of the disposal of the subsidiayr
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