Assembly Meeting
President. The assembled representatives of member nations of the League of Nations elected by a majority of one vote Senor Alberto Guani of Chile, President of the eighth Assembly. Count Albert Dietrichstein Mensdorff-Pouilly of Austria was thus narrowly de- feated. Past Presidents in order of incumbency: Paul Hymans, Belgium, 1920; Herman Adriaan Van Karnebeek, the Netherlands, 1921; Augustine Edwards, Chile, 1922; Cosme de la Torriente y Peraza, Cuba, 1923; Giuseppe Motta, Switzerland, 1924; Senator Raoul Dandurand, Canada, 1925; Mont-chilo Nintchitch, Jugoslavia, 1926.
Statesmen. Among the famed statesmen noted at Geneva: Richard William Alan Onslow, Earl of Onslow, calm and ponderous. Next to him was observed his boss, natty Sir Austen Chamberlain, British Foreign Minister.
In the French group was Aristide Briand, Foreign Minister, looking tired and bored, more shaggy than ever, his half-closed eyes often gazing at the ceiling. M. Joseph Paul-Boncour, restless, smiling, alert, was in startling contrast to Louis Loucheur, heavy, stolid, inscrutable. Everybody noted, regretted, the absence of jovial, concise, dapper Henry de Jouvenel, recently resigned.
Among the Germans was Herr Doktor Gustav Stresemann, Reich Foreign Minister and leader of the Teuton delegation, his lynx-like eyes darting about, occasionally flashing with amusement. But never did his thin lips part in a smile, nor his heavy jowls open to emit a guffaw. Noted was his extreme pallor. With him was Count Johann Heinrich von Bern-storff, onetime German Ambassador to Washington, sphinxlike, debonair, aging.
Others were: Count Albert Ap-ponyi, grand old man of Hungary, stalwart, patriarchal, kindly; Diarmuid O'Hegarty of the Irish Free State, soporific by his extreme laxity; Michael MacWhite, also of the Irish Free State, onetime Foreign Legionnaire, rough and ready.
Absent. The following members were noted as not having sent delegations: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Honduras, Peru, Spain. The following non-members were also absent: U. S., Mexico, Russia, Turkey, Egypt.
Peace. As forecast (TIME, Sept, 12) peace was the main topic of discussion in the Assembly deliberations. The speeches of the week, however, resolved themselves into long-winded bursts of impotent oratory, no matter how brilliant and forceful they may be viewed from a literary standpoint. Poland brought forward a plan: 1) Any recourse to war in order to settle international disputes is and remains forbidden. 2) Every dispute of whatever nature arising between states or nations cannot be settled except by pacific means. In consequence, the Assembly urges members of the League to take action on these declarations and conform to their principles in their mutual relations. The powers would have none of it; it was too definite. Poland modified the plan:
1) All wars of agression are forbidden.
2) The Assembly declares that states members of the League of Nations assume the obligation to conform to this principle.
In consequence the Assembly invites states members of the League of Nations to proceed to the conclusion of compacts of non-agression, inspired by the idea that pacific means should be employed for the settlement of differences of every kind arising between states.
The powers would have none of it; it was even more definite than the first. And in this kind of atmosphere of distrust and suspicion the Assembly showed signs of breaking up into cabals. Briand Speech. The most noteworthy speech of the week was that of French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand. He had, indeed made a brilliant oratorical effort the day before--so brilliant that women had thrown flowers at him in the fervor of their admiration and men had cheered themselves hoarse. But on this occasion, when the man who has been called the "Richelieu of Europe" pleaded for world peace, strong men wept. He proclaimed the passionate desire of France-- "who had been nailed to the bloody cross of a war she has no desire to see repeated"--to be freed from the horrors of modern hostilities; and pledged his faith in the League. Bringing his clenched fist down upon the table with an unstatesmanly crash, he cried: "The world people will see to this, for if the League disappeared they would see that they were in danger of new and bloody conflicts; hence will they defend it with tenacity and trace for us our duty." World Court. The German government, through Foreign Minister Stresemann, let it be known that it would shortly accept the compulsory arbitration clause of the permanent court of international justice. This means that the Reich, first of all the great powers, has offered to blaze the.trail of peace by accepting in advance, without any reservations whatever, the verdicts of the World Court, to which it pledges itself to refer all disputes with other nations. The announcement was cheered. Militarism. Felix Cielens, Foreign Minister of Latvia, drew the attention of the Assembly to the 1926 military budgets of Europe, which he said amounted to $1,500,000,000, or about the same amount expended in 1913, while the aggregate number of soldiers, more than 3,000,000, was only slightly under the 1913 figure. Panama Canal. Dr. Eusebio A. Morales, Minister of the Treasury of Panama, representing the Central American republic, denied that his country had not been true to the League, stated that unless the U. S. recognized Panama's sovereignty over the Canal Zone, the dispute should be referred to an impartial court of arbitration-- taken to mean the World Court.