effective service, especially by the possession of arms and skill in their
use. These requisites are not generally found in more advanced
communities.

In like manner, the decrees of an international tribunal might be enforced
either by the creation of an international army or by calling upon as many
of the nations as necessary to aid in coercing the non-law-abiding member
of the international community. Each nation is already armed and ready.

Whatever may be thought of the ultimate possibility of an international
army, it must be evident that the principle of the posse must serve us at
the outset. An international army would always consist in part of members
of the nation to be coerced, whereas, in selecting a posse those furthest
in race and in sympathy from the offender might always be chosen, just as
members of a hostile clan would make up the best posse to arrest a
Highlander for sheep-stealing.

Moreover, the posse has been used internationally more than once, as when
decrees have been pronounced by a general European Congress and some
particular nation or nations have been charged with their execution.

When a frontier community that has been a law unto itself gets its first
sheriff, the earliest visible result is not impossibly a sudden increase,
instead of a decrease, of violence. There is a war of the community,
represented by the sheriff and the good citizens, against all the bad
ones. Even so it may be expected that among the first results of an
effective agreement to enforce the decrees of an international tribunal,
would be an exceptionally great and violent war. Sooner or later some
nation would be sure to take issue with an unpopular decree and refuse to
obey it. This would probably be one of the larger and more powerful