disputes arising could be voluntarily referred; (3) that provision
should be made for independent inquiry and report as to the merits of
trade disputes; (4) that legal penalties for breach of an award or of an
agreement made to settle a trade dispute should not be imposed; (5) that
the decisions of industrial tribunals and arbitrators should be
co-ordinated as far as possible, and that there should be opportunity
for interchange of opinion between the arbitrators whose awards should
be circulated. A body of customary law on the subject would thus grow up
without legal sanction, but of great value in promoting uniformity and
preventing the ill-feeling which would arise from conflicting decisions
in different cases involving similar questions. Those who have taken any
part in deciding questions affecting wages or trade conditions have
found the need of some standard to appeal to, and felt the danger likely
to arise from giving decisions either less or more favourable to either
party than had been given in other districts in similar circumstances.
In an analogous way, decisions of the prize court of one country are
quoted in the courts of other countries, although they are not binding
on them. International Law did exist, and had an important practical
influence. Diplomatists did appeal to it, and the prize tribunals, in
administering the law, stated distinctly that they would be guided by
and would apply the principles of that law, even if the orders issued by
the administrative Government of their own country were at variance with
it. The decision of the Privy Council in the case of the _Zamora_
establishes the principle that the law which prize courts will follow is
International Law, and that they will do so though some Order in Council
may conflict with it.


FOOTNOTES: