The wreck of air-ships will call for peculiar provisions in order to protect the rights of the owner. He mentions negotiations begun upon the initiative of Mexico for a treaty of aviation between Mexico, the United States and Canada. I am informed by the Secretary of State, however, that nothing has been done towards an agreement on this subject. In case of crimes committed in the air, where the acts produce an effect in the underlying state, that state would have jurisdiction, while in case of acts in which the underlying state has no interest, the situation should be treated like similar acts upon the high seas. At this time it would be premature to lay down rules for the international law of war, but the author believes that the civilized states should unite in laying down uniform regulations upon this subject. The rules applicable to international aviation should not only be uniform but should also have the collective sanction of all the states. The author ridicules the idea of an aerial invasion commenced by the transportaion in several hours of an army corps by means of aeroplanes as an episode worthy only of a fantastic romance. He has not like Tennyson, "Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rained a From the nation's airy navies grappling in the central blue, warm, With the standards of the peoples plunging through the thunder storm." At the second juridical conference on aerial navigation held at Geneva the 28th and 29th of May, 1912, five new articles of the proposed Code of the Air were agreed upon to the effect that an aeronaut on the high seas or above land not belonging to any state should be governed by the laws of his nationality, that when above a foreign state, acts on board the ship which are of a nature to compromise the security or public order of the underlying state should be governed by the legislation and subject to the tribunals of that state, that the liability for damgae caused to persons or property in the underlying state should be governed by the law of that state, and that actions therefor may be brought either in its tribunals or in those of the nationality of the aeronaut, but that transactions in the air which are not of interest from the point of view of the security of public order of the underlying state remain subject to the jurisdiction of the nation to which the aeronaut belongs. Births or deaths upon an aerial voyage are to be put in the log of the vessel and communicated at the first locality where the aeronaut lands to the nearest national or consular authority of the nation to which the aeronaut belongs. At the meeting of the International Law Association in Paris on May 29, 1912, there was an interesting discussion upon the subject of the jurisprudence of the air. Papers were read upon the liberty of the air and upon wrecks of air-ships. M. Fauchille read a paper in regard to the International Judicial Committee on Aerial Navigation, calling attention to the labors of this body in the production of their draft "Code of the Air" which is to embrace public law, private law, including commercial law, administrative law, taxation and penal law. Such elaborate provisions seem to us in America premature, but possibly this is due to the backward state of the art of aviation amongst us as compared with some other nations. M. Fauchille took occasion to set forth his doctrine that the principle of the liberty of the air is the only one favorable to the expansion of aerial navigation and that this right should not be abandoned to the good will of states. He recognizes among the restrictions necessary for the protection of the subjacent state the right to prevent flight above certain regions, such as fortified places, and cities, the right to require the aviators to take out a license and to have proper skill, to forbid the passage of aerial ships of war or foreign forces in the air, to exercise rights of police and superintendence over aeronauts while in the air, to subject them to its tribunals where damage is caused to its territory or to persons upon its soil by reason of the acts of those in airships. M. Fauchille submitted seventeen articles already recommended by the Committee in regard to public law covering the right of navigation, the nationality of vessels and the regis tration of aeronauts, the matters of alighting, of throwing things from air-ships and of wrecks. The most interesting of these is the first article which provides that aerial navigation is free saving to the subjacent states the right to take measures on behalf of their own security and that of the persons and property of their inhabitants. In the discussion of this paper which followed, an Austrian delegate declared himself in favor of the German theory of the sovereignty of the state over the air, but subject to an international servitude of free passage. A paper was also read by Mr. Hazeltine, a Reader in English law at Cambridge, upon the subject of State Sovereignty in the Air Space, taking the same position as in his volume on "The Law of the Air" that the control of a state over the air space above is absolute. The session reached no final conclusion upon the subject, but appointed a commission to prepare a report upon the whole matter for their meeting at Madrid this year (1913). While as shown by the discussions in the Institute of International Law, the Continental jurists for the most part favor the doctrine of the freedom of the air, limited only by the security of the underlying states, one has only to turn to the treatise on Air Sovereignty by Dr. J. F. Lycklama to find this position denied in toto. After an examination of the various Continental codes and many of the decisions of Continental courts, the author comes out squarely for the position of the unlimited sovereignty of the states over the air above them. This author points out the difficulty of drawing any dividing line between the upper and lower levels of the atmosphere and alludes to the fact that the improvements in the art of artillery are such that to concede to the underlying state the rights of sovereignty within the range of its guns would practically result in turning over to the sovereignty of the underlying state the entire realm of the atmosphere in which aviation is practicable. The English position seems to be that the state has unlimited sovereignty over the air above its soil. This position is very clearly taken in Hazeltine's Law of the Air and in February of this year the passage of foreign air-ships over certain areas of England was forbidden altogether. A certain nervousness has also been exhibited by the Russians and complaints have been made of their firing upon German air-ships which had not crossed the Russian border. The German military air fleet is believed to have a greater predominance over the fighting air craft of other countries than the English navy has over their navies, and the prospect of foreign vessels exploring the atmosphere of England and testing out by experiment the possibility to carry on serious operations there, is enough to disturb the equanimity of an Englishman and also to point out the necessity of allowing each state for the purpose of its defense, all necessary control of the atmosphere overhead both in peace and in war. It would be preposterous to suppose that England would be bound by the rules of International Law to submit to unregulated cruises of air-ships above its territory, something likely to result in enormous mischief to the country in times of war since the long journeys already made by the Zeppelin ships demonstrate only too clearly their ability to become formidable engines of war. On the other hand, in dealing with the question of the actual power of the state over the air it should be borne in mind that a height is soon reached at which the air becomes no longer suitable for respiration or for the maneuvers of the flying craft and that with the present progress of artillery intended for use in firing upon air-ships, it is practically possible for a state to exercise authority over the atmosphere above its soil so far as it is available for aviation. It is conceded by all that the right of aerial navigation is unlimited so far as the air over the high seas is concerned and the same principal should undoubtedly be applicable to air above maritime highways, which are open to the ships of all nations. To compel air vessels, however, to follow the devious paths of the seas would be to lose one of the principal advantages of the use of the air, which lends itself to a much greater extent than the sea to journeys upon a direct lines. It substitutes an air line for a water route between two points. The air over territorial waters might perhaps be conceded to be subject to the sovereignty of the state to the same extent as the territorial waters themselves. In such air, as in the territorial waters, there would exist the right of innocent free passage for the ships of all nations, with the exception of vessels of war when the state chooses to exclude them. But it is a necessary consequence of the doctrine that the state has absolute control of the air within its borders for every purpose, that it may refuse to permit the passage of flying craft even for the most innocent purpose and it is conceivable that in this manner such a country as for example Switzerland or Servia, could be deprived absolutely of access through the air. This is following the swing of the pendulum too far, and it would be unfortunate to seek repose in such a conclusion. The maxim that "he who owns the earth owns it to the Heavens" is no more worthy of respect than the other maxim that the "air is free to all" and the expression "free as the air" certainly would have very little significance if persons were not allowed to go about in it. It seems impossible to divide the air into zones below a certain height to belong to the underlying state and above a certain height to be free for purposes of innocent navigation, and while the safety of the state would receive every possible protection against spying, smuggling, violating of quarantine, the entry of criminals, and the like, since the normal state of nations is peace and not war, it ought not to be possible for a state to put an end absolutely to all kinds of aerial navigation over its frontiers. The right of the state to protect itself ought to be limited by the reasonable necessity of protection and a general interdict on the passage of flying machines over its soil ought not to meet with the approval of international jurists anywhere. When some future William Tell shall address the storms of his native land: "Blow! Ye are the winds of liberty." I hope no jurist will be found to answer, "On the contrary, William, these are the winds of Switzerland, and any foreigner riding on the gale will be sentenced to six months imprisonment at hard labor." The air-ship offers a new facility not only for the evasion of the customs and quarantine laws of the states, but for the introduction of undesired aliens. It is related that when the first aviator safely alighted upon the English shore, he was shortly waited upon by the Customs Officers of the realm inquiring if he had anything to declare, and while this incident created some humor at the time, it will obviously become necessary when |