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Show I WIRELESS ON NEUTRAL TERRITORY. Professor Edward Elliott defends the order Issued by the government placing a censorship on all wireless stations on the Pacific Coast. Profes sor Elliott is a lecturer on international interna-tional law at the University of California Cali-fornia and his comments are most in tere6ting The wireless situation has already become acute All private radio sta- Hons along the Pacific Coast have re- ped orders to cease operations till I ; further notice; amateur operators are Hji threatened with the loss of their l! plants if they are found to be com Hi municatlng messages from the land to j belligerent vessels at sea; and the radio rooms of all belligerent vessels lying In the harbor have been sealed I wltb the official custoniB seal, accord- Hj ing to the reports. These are radical and stringent I measures and constitute such a scri- Ki cus interference with the freedom ot II activity of neutralB that it is worth while seeing on what ground the gov- 1 1 ernment is standing. It is a funda- mental principle of international law i - i: that a neutral shall be as free in time of war as in times of peace to I j carry on his commercial activities. ''-J There are well recognized exceptions I I to this principle which have come ' J about as the result of a compromise - i between the conflicting interests of I Hi th belligerent, who wishes to injure H his enemy by cutting him off from VJ supplies and munitions of war, and of tf,'Hi the neutral who wishes not to be dis II turbed by a war in which he has no rj concern. So for example in the mat- I ter of contraband, the neutral is al- -jM! lowed to carry on the trade, but at ijri the risk of the capture of his goods '.TM y tn0 other belligerent, but the in- H tcrest of the belligerent has won out Vj in the matter of supplying the bel- I i liferents with ships of war. The Kr'.j history of the struggle between these Hj conflicting Interests shows a constant H increase in the right of the neutral 9 to carry on his national life unaffect- ' ( ed by the war. , Where shall the victory He in the jr'Hi case of this new means of communi- ipj, cation? it would seem that the de- tTxjl rislou has already been made and Ir.l that the right of the belligerent to fiQut n'B enemy from communlca- o. tion had triumphed over the right of Hi the neutral to carry on his enterprise. jyJJ lreless is such a new means of S'Jj communication and of such a peculiar sort that we hare not had much ex- perlence of It In time of war. A very gfij Interesting case occurred in the Rus- msa, so-Japanese war when the Russians 9gO declared that they would treat as jyEgjl spies those sending wireless messages pH fiom the boat which had been fitted KHi out with a wireless apparatus by the E&j New York and the London Times. II Such a threat was ridiculous, but it Is H indicative of the spirit toward this strange mastery of the air. HB At The Hague conference it was Hal thought wise to take up the matter MU of the use of the wireless and a proving provi-ng ion was adopted forbidding a bel jfflf 'igerent to establish a wireless sta BR tion on neutral territory or to use Mj cne previously erected for an exclu-tBm, exclu-tBm, ,ivc m Hilary purpose and which has not been opened to the use of the public. This provision was the direct result of the establishment of. a tireless tire-less station on Chinese territory , nuring the Russo-Japanese . A second provision of 1 he Hague conference was to the effect that a neutral was not paired to forbW or restrict the use. in behalf Of bjl llgerents. of telegraph or telephone cables or wireless telegraph apparatus belonging to it or to JjftleJJ private individuals From this provi slon it is evident that the I States was not under an obligation U) put into effect such "tringen orders or-ders In doing so did she go bejond what an enlightened sense of her international in-ternational duty demanded From the outset, almost o our na H tional life the United States hM stood at the front In the recognition and enforcement of a high standard, of neutrality. Washington issued the . in- i,fnmnl nn and tne. i I'nlied States first passed a neutrai-1 neutrai-1 Lti statute; and our government has ! long advocated the freedom from capture cap-ture of private property on the nign . 8eas So it is in accord with our historv that we should be leaders in 1 the control of a method of communi-i communi-i cation which may so easily be the I means for the violation of our neu-tralltv neu-tralltv bv making the territory of the United States serve in a very true sense as a base of military opera tions . It is verv apparent that there is a vast difference between a radio station sta-tion flashing its messages everywhere and a cable firmly attached at each end and capable of delivering its messages mes-sages onlv to a particular spot Thus far it has been left to the belligerent to interrupt this sort of communication communica-tion DJ cutting the cable somewhere outside neutral waters but the belligerent bellig-erent ran not put the wireless station sta-tion on neutral territory out of com mission except by a violation of the neutral territory It is by no means 'certain, however, that it may not turn out to be necessary to censor the cables to prevent an indirect use of them in an unlawful way or to maintain that strict impartiality which neutrality demand" |