Since a conference of nations can meet and decide on the mitigation of
the horrors of war, it is certainly conceivable that a tribunal of
nations can prevent war. Such a tribunal would in no respect differ
from the Supreme Court of the United States in its fundamental
foundations. As our Supreme Court is final in settling all disputes in
this country, so the international court would be final in adjusting
all controversies between the nations. And such a court is clearly the
next decisive step in the promotion of this great task of securing
world-peace.

If nations can agree to establish war as their arbiter of peace, why
can they not establish a more peaceful substitute? It is possible, for
there is nothing in the nature of strife that cannot be settled, no
quarrel that cannot be judged, no difficulty that cannot be
satisfactorily adjusted.

With the establishment of a true world-court, there would rise on the
vision of the nations for the first time the prospect of justice for
the united whole of mankind. Justice to the smaller countries would
be secured; encroachments by the strong upon the weak would be
prevented; the moral standard of politics would be uplifted; and
though every step would be exposed to the selfishness, corruption, and
love of despotism that are prevalent in all men, yet is it not
reasonable to suppose that, as progress is now being made in the
various nations for overcoming these evils, so it would be made in
this united whole, to the unspeakable benefit of mankind?

This country has been foremost in the promotion of this great movement
to organize the world. It is especially fitting that the United States
should take the lead. The greatest nation having a government of the
people and by the people, with the longest experience and the greatest
success, is best fitted to lead others. We have the form of national
government which foreshadows the form of world-government.
Theoretically, our states are sovereign; all rights which are not
formally surrendered by accepting the Constitution of the United
States are reserved to them. In a like manner, referring to the
establishment of a world-court, the nations individually will be
expected to surrender to the nations collectively only such
jurisdiction as pertains to the settling of their controversies.

A world-court would appeal to the strongest, the purest, and the
deepest thinkers of every race. It would cover a new field, appealing
to reason