(e) will make provision to secure and maintain freedom of communications and of transit and equitable treatment for the commerce of all Members of the League. In this connection, the special necessities of the regions devastated during the war of 1914-1918 shall be borne in mind;

(f) will endeavor to take steps in matters of international concern for the prevention and control of disease.

ARTICLE 24.

There shall be placed under the direction of the League all international bureaux already established by general treaties if the parties to such treaties consent. All such international bureaux and all commissions for the regulation of matters of international interest hereafter constituted shall be placed under the direction of the League.

In all matters of international interest which are regulated by general conventions but which are not placed under the control of international bureaux or commissions, the Secretariat of the League shall, subject to the consent of the Council and if desired by the parties, collect and distribute all relevant information and shall render any other assistance which may be necessary or desirable.

The Council may include as part of the expenses of the Secretariat the expenses of any bureau or commission which is placed under the direction of the League.

ARTICLE 25.

The Members of the League agree to encourage and promote the establishment and co-operation of duly authorized voluntary national Red Cross organizations

having as purposes the improvement of health, the prevention of disease, and the mitigation of suffering throughout the world.

ARTICLE 26.

Amendments to this Covenant will take effect when ratified by the Members of the League whose representatives compose the Council and by a majority of the Members of the League whose Representatives compose the Assembly.

No such amendment shall bind any Member of the League which signifies its dissent therefrom, but in that case it shall cease to be a Member of the League.

ANNEX

I. ORIGINAL MEMBERS OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS SIGNA

TORIES OF THE TREATY OF PEACE

ANNEX V

MEMORANDUM ON THE COVENANT
OF THE

LEAGUE OF NATIONS

(Copyrighted 1919 by William H. Blymyer)

The Drafting Committee of the Paris Conference on the constitution for The League of Nations, having adopted the greater part of the suggestions presented in my Memorandum on the Draft (published March 1-10, and of which you may have received a copy), I am encouraged to make further comments on the revised instrument, as adopted April 27, 1919, and called the "Covenant."

The most important of the suggestions in that Memorandum which have been followed, "VIII," resulted in the amendment of Article 16 so as to apply to obligations under Article 13 and 15, as well as Article 12, supposedly to extend the sanction of non-intercourse to force nations to comply with decisions, as well as to submit to the jurisdiction of the League; as it was pointed out, that the failure to comply, was as much an affront to the authority of the League, as the failure to submit.

At the same time, the clause from Article XII of the Draft, was transposed to Article 16, making "the resort to war" an essential element in a case for the application of the penalty of non-intercourse, which is equivalent to the rejection of that mode of enforcement, because of the

infrequency of cases combining those conditions in ordinary times.

The Committee also has added to the Draft, in giving heed to the following suggestions:

"I": the word "any" in setting forth the matter with which the body of delegates (Assembly) may deal; "II": the first paragraph in Article V, defining the votes required for decisions; "III": to remove ambiguity, the catagoric inclusion by name, in the "Annex," of British dominions and colonies; "VI": the additions of the new penalty of expulsion from the League (Article 16) and of clauses in the seventh and the last clauses of this new provision (Article 16) excluding the nations in dispute from voting; "VIII": the extension, if only in principle, of the sanction of non-intercourse; "XI": the limitation for the duration of the League, at least as far as each member is concerned by the provision for withdrawal in Article I; and, I might add, the substitution throughout the instrument of the word "Members" for "high-contracting parties," suggested in an interview, published in the New York Times, of February 16, 1919.

The manner in which these amendments have been made, however, does not leave the Articles free from serious defects:

Conformity to suggestion "I" by supplying the word "any" before "matter," in Article II of the Draft, has obviated the distinction made between the Council and the body of delegates in the general conferment of powers to those bodies; but, while allurements are now held out stronger than ever that the larger body is to constitute the democratic representation of all the nations, by calling it the "Assembly," instead of the "body of delegates,"