for its own defense, the Government of Cuba will sell or lease to the United States lands necessary for coaling or naval stations at certain specified points to be agreed upon with the President of the United States.

VIII. That by way of further assurance the Government of Cuba will embody the foregoing provisions in a permanent treaty with the United States. (31 U. S. Stat. L., p. 895; Treaties and Conventions, 1776-1909, Vol. I, p. 362.)

The above provisions were also embodied in the Cuban constitution of 1901, which was promulgated May 20, 1902, on which date the United States withdrew "as an intervening power." The articles contain the provisions bearing on the relations of the United States and Cuba so far as concern the international conditions under consideration.

The first article limits the right of Cuba to make compacts with foreign powers which will impair Cuban independence or to alienate control of territory.

The second article limits the power to incur indebted

ness.

The third article gives the United States right to intervene to preserve Cuban independence and maintain. orderly government.

Articles 4, 5, 6, and 8 have no particular bearing on the situation under consideration.

Article 7 provides for the sale or lease to the United States of lands for coaling or naval stations.

Undoubtedly the United States has by this and other agreements acquired a certain control over Cuba. The intention of the Republic of Cuba was to confine the grant of privileges and rights to the United States by a strict and narrow interpretation. The message of the President of Cuba of November 2, 1903, says

of two formulas of grant, "sale or lease "--of portions of territory to which the United States had the right for the establishment of naval and coaling stations-the one that would least wound Cuban sentiment was accepted. Of such stations we granted the least number possible, and the conditions inserted in the convention regulating the lease of the same are so many more limitations of that grant, all favorable to the Republic of Cuba. (U. S. Foreign Relations, 1903, p. 365.)

Importation of war materials.-Article 5 of the lease of 1903 provides that supplies and munitions of war shall not be subject to customs and other dues if destined for exclusive use in the leased area and discharged therein. Discharge at other points makes such goods liable to regular customs laws.

The United States is therefore specifically prohibited the enjoyment of exceptional advantages in respect to other ports than those held under lease and has no exceptional advantages elsewhere for importation of supplies for the leased areas.

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Interpretation of lease.-The legal consequences which flow from a lease are not such as follow the transfer of sovereignty. If a State, the neutrality of which is guaranteed or whose jurisdiction over a certain area is in any way qualified as a State, should lease a part of the area, the lease would carry with it only such rights as the lessor was competent to grant according to the maxim nemo plus juris in alterum transferre protest, quam ipse habet." Such leases are, therefore, strictly construed. It is conceivable that a State which has made a lease of a part of its territory to a foreign State might go to war with the State which held the lease or it might remain neutral. In the event of neutrality, however, the leased territory under the jurisdiction of the belligerent would, according to its character, be liable to the consequences of war. If the leased territory was merely for the purpose of a scientific experiment station, a hospital, or lighthouse, it would be liable to treatment as such; if a naval base or fortification, its liability would correspond. If the lease was made in good faith and not during a war, with the purpose of furnishing the belligerent with a base, the lessor State would not be violating any obligation.

The United States in its leased territory is entitled to the privileges and bound by the obligations of the leases. In the case of Cuba certain international negotiations may be carried on by the Cuban Government without consideration of the United States. The Cuban Army may be organized in accord with Cuban desires. Cer

tain acts which might imperil the existence of Cuba as a State may not be undertaken because prohibited by the treaty with the United States.

The Ionian Islands.-Article I of the treaty of Paris of November 5, 1815, between "Great Britain and Austria, Prussia, and Russia, respecting the Ionian Islands,” provides that certain named islands "shall form a single, free, and independent State, under the denomination of the United States of the Ionian Islands."

Article II provides that-

This State shall be placed under the mandate and exclusive protection of His Majesty the King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, his heirs and successors.

The remaining articles provide for the exercise of this right of protection, Article V stating:

In order to insure, without restriction, to the inhabitants of the United States of the Ionian Islands the advantages resulting from the high protection under which these States are placed, as well as for the exercise of the rights inherent in the said protection, His Britannic Majesty shall have the right to occupy fortresses and places of those States and to maintain garrisons in the same. The military force of the said United States shall also be under orders of the commander in chief of the troops of His Britannic Majesty.

And in Article VII:

The trading flag of the United States of the Ionian Islands shal} be acknowledged by all the contracting parties as the flag of a free and independent State. (I Hertslet, Map of Europe by Treaty, pp. 337-341.)

In 1854, during the Crimean War, while the above treaty was still in effect and Great Britain at war with Russia, certain Ionian ships were captured by British cruisers on the ground that "being British subjects they were illegally trading with the enemy." This raised the question "whether the inhabitants of the Ionian Islands were to be considered as British subjects or not." The question was elaborately argued and came before Dr. Lushington for judgment.

For the purposes of decision the vessel proceeded against was an Ionian vessel under the Ionian flag bound

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for a Russian port and captured by a British cruiser. It was claimed "that as regards a power hostile to Great Britain the Ionian islanders stand in the same position. as British subjects." As the Ionian Islands had not declared war, the further question arose "whether, Great Britain being at war with Russia, it follows as an inevitable consequence that the Ionian States are placed at war with Russia also. * * Whether, Great Britain being at war with Russia, the Ionian States are ex necessitate at war also, exactly in the same way as Jersey, Guernsey, Jamaica, and Canada would be placed in hostility by a declaration of war against Great Britain by any other power." (2 Spinks, Ecclesiastical and Admiralty Reports, pp. 212, 216.) Dr. Lushington maintained that while Great Britain, as a result of her conquests in 1815, might have made a different disposition of the Ionian Islands, she did actually determine their status by the treaty of 1815, and Dr. Lushington adds that he is of the opinion that no right remained to Great Britain other than 'can be found within the four corners of that treaty. * * From this document must be derived all the rights of the contracting parties and all the rights and obligations of her Ionian States."

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Dr. Lushington maintains that Great Britain by the treaty had extreme rights over the Ionian Islands. He says:

I will now make a short summary of this treaty; it will show some of the anomalies. A single, free, and independent State, having the flag of a free and independent State-the military, naval, and diplomatic power all vested in the protecting State the protected, not the subjects of the protector, nor British subjects, for that is perfectly clear. (Ibid., p. 220.)

Application of Dr. Lushington's reasoning.—The case of the Ionian ships offers certain parallels which make it possible to apply Dr. Lushington's reasoning to the relations between the United States and Cuba. The relations between the United States and Cuba are far less close than were those between Great Britain and the Ionian States; therefore Dr. Lushington's conclusions would in general apply more emphatically to the rela

tions of the United States and Cuba. He maintains that war between a protecting and a foreign State does not necessarily involve the protected State in war. He further concludes that if Great Britain had a right to make a declaration of war involving the Ionian States, this could not be done without express statement; and that hostile character could not be imposed upon the protected State in absence of an agreement whose terms were not open to doubt. Dr. Lushington restored the captured property as not concerned in the war. Cuba and Cuban property in time of war between the United States and a foreign power would, according to the treaty between the United States and Cuba, be less closely related to the war than was the Ionian property in 1854.

Application of Declaration of London.-In this situation it is granted that the Declaration of London is binding. While the Declaration had not been proclaimed up to July, 1912, the principles of the Declaration were accepted by Italy as binding in the Turco-Italian War of 1911-12. The Italian attitude is shown as follows:

By a royal decree of October 13 the following instructions were approved in conformity with the principles of the Declaration of Paris, April 16, 1856, which belligerent countries are bound to respect, with the rules of The Hague Conventions of October 18, 1907, and of the Declaration of London of February 26, 1909, which the Government of the King desires to be respected as well, so far as the provisions of the laws in force in the Kingdom allow, although they have not yet been ratified by Italy; and they will serve to regulate the conduct of naval commanders in the operations of capture and prize during the war. (Dispatch to U. S. State Dept., Oct. 19, 1911.)

From the action of Italy it may be inferred that even if not ratified the Declaration of London will be regarded as the most satisfactory available statement of the principles of international law relating to maritime capture. It is admitted in this situation that supplies of the contraband are being carried by merchant vessels of a neutral State to Habana, when they may be sent by rail to Guantanamo, which is a naval station of the United States. Under the rules prevailing in regard to continuous voyage before the Declaration of London, such a