remains true that their several governing agencies are conceived of as acting, ad hoc, as mere agencies of the central government.

As thus regarded, the operations of local governments are commonly subject to greater supervision and control by the central authorities than are the activities of the member States of a federal union. Ordinarily the acts of federated States, if falling within the constitutional fields marked out for them by the national constitution, are not subject to censure or annulment by the central government. It is only when some prohibition of the national constitution is violated, or some national right invaded, that a cause for national intervention arises. With regard to local governments, however, the central government usually exercises a continuous and comprehensive supervision.

For the most part it is within the discretion of the federated States to determine whether or not their constitutional powers shall be exercised. For local governments there is usually no such option. To them their duties are more often mandatory in character, and, when there is a failure upon their part to carry out the orders which they have received, the correction usually comes in a more direct and summary manner than is the case when the States of a federal union are derelict in the fulfillment of their federal obligations.

Because of the wide range of their autonomous powers, the member States of all federated unions are equipped with practically complete frame-works of government,— executive, legislative and judicial,-so complete, in fact, that, should the central government be destroyed, these States would be practically ready at once to exercise through their existing governments the functions previously performed by the general government, and thus to stand forth as fully organized bodies-politic. Strongly

contrasted with this completeness of organization are the governmental agencies of the most autonomous and selfgoverning administrative areas. In very many cases, indeed, local governments possess no real legislative bodies, but only executive officials who have ordinance-making powers. Thus, in the entire United States, there is not a single local government, if we except the cities, which is provided with a legislative body, distinct from the executive agents, and composed of elected representatives of the people; although there are in the "Towns" brief annual meetings of the citizens or taxpayers. In England, since 1888, there have been locally-elected "County Councils," and, since 1894, "District Councils," but these have had administrative rather than legislative powers and they operate almost wholly through committees.

CHAPTER XVI

LAW AND SOVEREIGNTY AS ENVISAGED BY INTERNATIONAL

LAW

THUS far, in considering the sovereign State as a concept of public law, we have been dealing with it in its national aspect, and have found it to be conceived of as a legal person possessing a legally supreme will, and its commands as having the force of positive law. We come now to consider in what sense and to what extent a similar conception is applicable when the State is regarded, not in its relations to those individuals who are within the control of its municipal law, but as vis-à-vis to other States which are similarly sovereign with regard to their respective citizens or subjects.

From what has been already said, it will have appeared, first of all, that, in International Law, the State is envisaged as a "person." It is an entity viewed as possessing a will, and as the subject of rights and obligations. This personality is similar in its conceptual character to that of the State of municipal law, and, in the great majority of cases, the sovereign municipal person has also an international personality. The two personalities are, however, distinct, and only error can result from confusing or identifying them. The rights and obligations which are connoted by international personality are different, both in essential nature and in content, from those which spring from municipal personality, and they are created, applied and enforced by different

means.

Based upon its predicated sovereignty, the State of national or municipal law asserts that there are no limits to its will, and that the expressions of that will operate as commands to all those over whom it chooses to claim authority. The State, municipally considered, is not the creation of law, but lives and has its being in the realm of law, for, at the same time that it is the sole and ultimate source of all law it is, by its very nature, compelled to operate according to the rules thus laid down. It is able to act only through its Government, and an act unauthorized by law, even though committed by a government official, is not an act of the Government or of the State of which it is the agent.

As contrasted with this municipal conception of the State, the State of International Law asserts that it has de facto power or control over a given territory, and that it will not tolerate within its limits the exercise of any political authority save such as it consents to. Reciprocally, it holds itself responsible to other States for the manner in which, in the exercise of such exclusive jurisdiction, it may affect the rights or interests of other States.

This may be said to be the central conception of International Law, and, if all States were content with their existing territories, if boundaries were certain and undisputed, and if each State held itself unconcerned with whatever action might be taken by other States within their several limits, no opportunity for international discord would be presented. But, in fact, territorial boundaries have not been certainly and finally fixed, and, until the present, there have been vast areas of lands in Asia and Africa and elsewhere which have had no governments the rights of which have been recognized by the greater States of the world, and there has been a constant struggle between these greater States to bring

within their respective controls the areas which by practically common consent have been considered as appropriate for annexation. Also, there have been the high seas, which are treated as subject to no sovereign control and as therefore open to free and common use by the citizens of all the States. These waters, however, have not been neutralized in the sense that in time of war belligerent operations upon them may not be conducted.

Furthermore, although each State claims exclusively jurisdiction over its own territories, it does not hold itself indifferent to what other States may do within their respective territories. Over those persons whom, according to its own municipal law, it claims as its own citizens and as owing primary allegiance to itself, each State asserts a right to exercise a certain amount of guardianship wherever they may be. And, in addition to this, it is urged as a matter of international comity, if not of strict right, that, subject to reasonable police restrictions, other States should permit these citizens to travel and reside and carry on business within their several jurisdictions. Thus it has come about, especially during recent years when the means of transportation and communication have been highly developed, that every great State has a considerable number of its citizens travelling or residing in the other States of the world. And, even when its citizens are not thus abroad, they have many commercial relations with the citizens of other States or directly with those States themselves.

In all these cases, each State asserts the right to see that the persons and property of its respective citizens. are reasonably protected against violence or unduly discriminative treatment. Finally, all the States of the world have entered into many special treaty relations with one another whereby their general international rights and responsibilities have been modified. Thus