1  At the end of 1918, the Central American Court of Justice (1907–18) (‘CACJ’) shuttered its doors and came to an end. The CACJ made one vital mistake: it ruled against Nicaragua, a key United States (‘US’) ally at the time. The US sought complete control over Nicaragua through the Bryan–Chamorro Treaty (1914). It stipulated that the US would have complete canal rights in Nicaragua and the right to military intervention. Costa Rica won the case by citing an earlier treaty between the two countries: the Cañas–Jerez Treaty (1858). It stipulated that Nicaragua would have to negotiate first with Costa Rica before entering any treaty that would affect Costa Rica (see Ripley (2018)). Nicaragua and the US refused to sign the CACJ’s second ten-year renewal, which officially ended Washington’s role as guarantor of the Court (Ripley (2018)).

2  In its prime, the CACJ was no slouch. Although similar efforts were attempted in entities such as the Central American Integration System (SICA) (1991) and SICA’s own regional court system, the CACJ was the first international court to which all parties would give a higher power consent to review state behaviour and abide by its rulings. During its ten-year run, it successfully adjudicated controversial cases between the five Central American countries: Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. These cases included issues such as maritime law, border issues, and intervention. Despite not being renewed, it was a major success at maintaining regional peace (Ripley (2018)). The CACJ also set the stage to support an inter-American court. The Organization of American States (OAS) commemorates the CACJ’s history, recognizing that ‘there was a precedent in the form of the Central American Court of Justice’ (OAS, ‘Our History’).

3  The desire for an inter-American court never faded in the US and Latin America. Before the CACJ was created, and long after its demise, peace movements continued to push for the use of international law and courts throughout the hemisphere. Instead of an anarchic world of conflict and war, the Americas could address issues through a regional judicial process. The creation of an inter-American court was the main goal. In 1923, five years after the demise of the CACJ, the Fifth International Conference of American States proposed an inter-American court. Similar to the CACJ, it would adjudicate conflictual relations and establish shared norms and principles between all the American states. An inter-American court would progress and evolve with the four main sources of international law: customs, rulings, treaties, and legal writings. In the end, an inter-American court never materialized. Although the inter-American court may be a story of failure, the ideas behind it are compelling in their own right. They embody admirable peace movements, painstaking regional conferences, and an unwavering commitment to international law and peace. It is a story that needs to be told.

4  Zeitgeists are often difficult to explain. At the turn of the twentieth century, there was a strong zeitgeist for replacing bellicosity with diplomacy, armaments with supranational organizations, and war with international law and regional organizations. The Pan-American Conference (1889–90), the Hague Conventions (1899 and 1907) (Hague Peace Conferences (1899 and 1907)), and various South and Central American conferences embodied this spirit of peace. Prior to the Fifth International Conference of American States, the previous four aimed at creating peace in creative ways. One notable agenda was the inter-exchange of professors and students throughout the Americas, including the US (Pan American Union (1922)). Although these conferences were blemished with the self-interest of the different countries involved, participants often believed they could pave the way for regional harmony. This was reflected in the notes of the previous conferences (Pan American Union (1922)).

5  The first Pan-American Conference took place in 1889. The persistent urging of Secretary of State James G Blaine contributed significantly to its success. Blaine had been lobbying the US government for a hemispheric conference since his first stint as Secretary of State under President James A Garfield, who held the position for only one year. He saw the US as the natural protector of the American hemisphere. His diplomatic effort to undermine European interventionism in the Americas served as his principal motive. The US was ‘the natural protector of the integrity of the Central American territory’, he declared right before the Pan-American Conference convened (LaFeber (1993) 33) (International Law, Regional Developments: Latin America, Regional Cooperation and Organization: American States). Although a principal objective of the conference was to ward off European intervention, the conference also embodied the idea that peace could be achieved through means other than war and conflict. The Secretary of State’s vision included the creation of an inter-American court, the harmonization of political policies and trade practices, and the general strengthening of the relations between countries throughout the hemisphere. Many Latin Americans also shared Blaine’s vision. Matías Romero, a Mexican diplomat fearful of European intervention, lobbied the US to intervene when the French attacked Mexico in 1862. Romero argued that the French were in violation of the Monroe Doctrine (Schoonover (1991)). In 1907, Washington ended its talking with action. It hosted the first Central American Peace Conference in 1907. Five major countries (Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Honduras) participated.

6  A fear of US power, however, still permeated the Americas. Romero was apprehensive of US regional influence. He understood the power Washington could wield to dominate the conferences and the Americas as a whole. He also recognized the inevitable clash of interests. In one case, Romero attacked Washington’s efforts to settle the border disputes between Mexico and Guatemala. He noted that the attempt was ‘unfavorable to the rights of Mexico’ (Romero, 1890, 354). Nonetheless, as the second vice-president to the Pan-American Conference, Romero saw international institution building and international law as a way to reach peaceful coexistence in the hemisphere. He further witnessed Blaine’s flexibility not only to compromise on important conference issues, but also to allow Latin Americans to advance their own ideas to solve hemispheric problems (Healy (2002)). Romero participated actively on the Mexican side, and initiated a number of ideas, including a customs union and inter-American commission for trade statistics in order to strengthen hemispheric relations (Marichal (2002)).

7  Critics have always levelled credible objections against international efforts such as The Hague Conventions and the Pan-American Conferences. Many have questioned their utility. Few international institutions actually materialized. Organizational procedures marginalized smaller states, and there was simply no international executive force to enforce the rules of the established treaties and agreements. ‘It did not even approve a US proposal for a court of neutral nations to arbitrate disputes’, laments prominent diplomatic historian George C Herring (2008 at 359), referring to the original convention. As for the Pan-American Conference, many Latin American skeptics perceived it as a vehicle for US imperialism. Prominent Latin Americans such as Cuban nationalist José Martí, who actually participated in the conference, feared US military adventurism into Latin American affairs (see Fernández-Retamar (2006) 41).

8  Furthermore, international institutions have come under attack by many prominent academics. ‘Realist’ international relations scholars have developed a large and influential body of literature challenging international law and institutions Legal Realism School, International Relations, Principal Theories). The main problem with the international system is anarchy (for an in-depth study on the variants of realism, see Doyle (1997) 41–195). Unlike the domestic sphere, which has the policing capabilities to make citizens comply with domestic laws, the international sphere lacks any comparable bodies to control or even monitor the behaviour of states. There is simply no governing body or force that can compel states to comply with international treaties, laws, and institutions in the first place. International institutions, therefore, do not have the authority to enforce their own rules. Hans Morgenthau, one of the pioneers of classical realism, reminds us that ‘[i]nternational politics cannot be reduced to legal rules and institutions’ (Morgenthau and others (2006) 4). David R Mares (2001) draws upon this premise to criticize Latin America. He contends that the increasing reliance on negotiation, conventions, and regional supranational institutions paradoxically led to more conflict, not less. ‘Between 1826 and 1889 at least 50 conventions among Latin American states prohibited the use of force to resolve disputes’, Mares laments, ‘[y]et this was the period of the bloodiest wars’ (Mares (2001) 48).

9  However, criticism fails to consider the success of international law and institutions in Latin America. Successes attract little scholarly attention, whereas failures draw more scrutiny. The League of Nations is a common case. Scholars often cite the League’s failure to stop Benito Mussolini’s Italy from invading Ethiopia, then known as Abyssinia, in 1935 (for a study on the inability of international institutions to facilitate peace, see Mearsheimer (1995)). However, the League was successful in South America. It not only negotiated a conflict between Colombia and Peru (1932–33) but also played a pivotal role in returning the disputed area of Leticia to Colombia after the ceasefire negotiations. This South American case demonstrates the potential importance for international law and institution building.

10  More importantly, criticism fails to contextualize the internationalist zeitgeist surrounding the rise of international institutions at the turn of the twentieth century. Peace organizations and transnational movements became a ubiquitous presence at that time (Ripley (2018)). These movements, united by their unwavering optimistic belief in human nature, progress, and international law, had significant influence over governmental policies. The Quakers, a pacifist protestant group (Members of the Society of Friends) based in the US, were a principal force and played an integral role in lobbying for peace and diplomacy. ‘It goes without saying that the Quakers are out in full force’, wrote the American Ambassador for the 1899 Hague meeting, ‘[t]he number of people with plans, schemes, notions, nostrums, whimsies of all sorts, who press upon us and try to take our time, is enormous’ (Best (1999) 623). Such peace movements swept the globe. Austrian activist and novelist Bertha von Suttner played a prominent role, by lobbying governments to support the initial Hague Conference and to create the Nobel Peace Prize, which she won in 1905 (Haberman (1972)).

11  The spirit of transnationalism and supranational institutions also took hold in Latin America. Latin American women, alongside their North American and European counterparts, played a principal role in the formation of Pan-American and supranational conventions. It is important to note that the international women’s movement was not a homogeneous group. In fact, many North American feminists harboured cultural prejudices against Latin American feminists (see Stoner (1991)). Nonetheless, activists such as the Brazilian scientist Constance Barbosa Rodrigues, a major participant in the Third Latin American Scientific Congress (1905), and Chilean educator Amanda Labarca, the president of Consejo Nacional de Mujeres and activist in a number of transnational congresses, helped facilitate the development of inter-American relations (Miller (1991)). They believed increased relations could create better cooperation among states.

12  The Central Americans involved in the creation of the CACJ viewed the Court not only as a child of the peace movement and an extension of the earlier international conventions, but also as the most unique judicial entity the world had seen. As Manuel Castro Ramírez (1918), a Salvadoran magistrate who spent five years on the Court, observed, the CACJ ‘constitutes the only type in the world with its arbitration powers and advanced judicial doctrines’ (at 177). In his memoirs, Ramírez (1918) defined the CACJ as a superior expansion of the Hague Conventions, one in which all the Central American republics would rely on to resolve their grievances. Other noted Central American legal scholars, such as Alfredo Martinez Moreno (1957) and Luis Pasos Argüello (1986), echoed similar sentiments by connecting the CACJ with the world peace movement. They observed that the zeitgeist of peace and institutionalism injected the region with feelings of optimism towards ending conflict through peaceful means.

13  Although the exact extent to which the movement affected the region and promoted peace can never be known, it did influence a large number of both private and public citizens. Famed Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío (1867–1916) was a strong advocate for replacing conflict with international institutions. He travelled and lectured the Americas for the cause of peace. ‘Señor Darío is now in this country on a lecture-tour’, commented the New York Times on one the poet’s many visits, ‘in the interests of international peace’ (Fay (1942) 642). Other Central Americans such as Honduran diplomat Carlos Gutiérrez Lozano and jurist Mariano Vásquez, who later became an outspoken supporter of the CACJ, published and lectured on the instrumental role of transnational relations and institutions (see Rosa Bautista (2005)). These influential Central American activists lobbied strongly for the creation of inter-American conventions, supranational institutions, and international law in order to modify the bellicose relations between states and create the conditions to advance more pacific coexistence. In fact, Central American governments had already begun to initiate regional institutional building prior to the CACJ. In 1889, the same year as the First Pan-American Conference, the Central American republics came together in San Salvador for the Third Central American Congress. This third effort to hammer out regional peace agreements culminated in the Provisional Union Pact of Central American States. With 27 written articles, the Union’s goal was to create the National Executive and other adjudicating bodies to curb the escalating conflicts between the republics (Dieta Centro-Americana (1889)). Although these initiatives failed to reconstitute the union, the Central Americans’ consistent labours to create and sustain supranational bodies not only reflect a belief in pacifism through international institutions but also helped to pave the way for the creation of the CACJ.

14  In addition to dismissing the international zeitgeist of peace, criticism fails to explain how Latin American countries were able to take advantage of internationalism to defend their sovereignty and independence against the growing power of the US. Initially, the young, newly independent Latin American nations looked towards the US for protection against not only foreign powers, but also themselves. As early as 1822, El Salvador, in fear of Mexican expansion after the coronation of Emperor Agustín Iturbide, requested US annexation (Bancroft (1887)). Nicaragua also looked towards the US for help balancing not only Mexico but also the encroaching power of Great Britain, which robbed Nicaragua of the Mosquito Coast, Nicaragua’s outlet to the Atlantic Ocean (Zamora (1995)). Nicaragua requested US aid and intervention to curb Great Britain’s penetration into the country. Latin Americans, however, grew increasingly more apprehensive and skeptical of their northern neighbour’s intentions and expansionism.

15  During the time of the first Pan-American Conference, there were a number of conventions that reflected this apprehension. These initiatives aimed to control US influence. El Congreso Jurídico Sudamericano (1889), held exclusively between South American states in Montevideo, had the principal objective of creating not only inter-state bodies to facilitate the development of inter-American laws and stability but also international investment regulation restricting Washington from interfering in their domestic politics. Carlos Calvo, an Argentine diplomat who wrote El derecho internacional teórico y práctico in 1868, played a significant part in this Latin American internationalism. A number of South American countries inserted his ‘Calvo Doctrine’ (Calvo Doctrine/Calvo Clause), a doctrine of non-intervention, into their national constitutions to limit US interventionism (see Calvo (1868)). Fellow Argentine Luis María Drago built upon Calvo’s beliefs to create his own Drago Doctrine (1902) to extend non-intervention to equate military intervention. His idea mushroomed across Latin America against US military intervention (Clemente (2020)).

16  On 3 May 1923, countries convened in Santiago, Chile, for the Fifth International Conference of American States. The goal to create an Inter-American Court personified the fifth conference. It inevitably failed. After the arduous negotiations, all the participants signed the 1923 Pan-American Treaty (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, US, Uruguay, and Venezuela). It was composed of ten articles detailing the peaceful settlement of conflict. It even created a Pan-American treaty to address complaints among the participatory states. Paraguay was an active participant. Paraguayan representative Manuel Gondra proposed the Gondra Treaty. Countries could submit complaints of conflict to Commissions, one in Washington and one in Uruguay, if diplomacy failed. This would be an adjudicating body of two five-member judicial bodies (OAS, ‘Peace Fund’). Although ideas were plentiful, why did the actual court, an Inter-American Court, fail to materialize?

17  Latin American scholars at the time were quick to attribute the failure to the economic giant of the north, the US. According to scholars and policymakers alike, the US purposely blocked its creation because such a judicial body would rule unfavourably against its imperial design in areas such as Central America and the Caribbean. The prominent Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío captured US expansionism in the beautifully written poem ‘To Roosevelt’ (1903): ‘You are the United States/You are the future invader’. The poet continued to observe US power, writing ‘The United States is strong and big/When it shakes there is a deep tremor/through the enormous vertebrae of the Andes’. The Argentinian daily La Prensa echoed similar sentiments. Editorials highlighted the Platt Amendment, which limited Cuba’s freedom and sovereignty. Historian Clifford B Casey (1933) wrote extensively on how the US tried to dominate the meetings. The ‘Hispanic American Republics’ wanted more access to the commissions and, in the fifth conference, a Pan-American Union. This meant more say in their developments and direction. ‘Consequently, the evident feeling of fear and mistrust toward the United States’, Casey concludes, ‘as displayed by the delegates of the Hispanic American Republics, is not known generally in this country’ (Casey (1933) 451).

18  The criticisms of Washington were far from unwarranted. US policy clearly laid out its objection to the Inter-American Court of Justice: ‘[y]ou may add that, if any of the other American Republics wish to create such a court, the United States would regard the move with friendly interest but could not participate in its establishment’ (Secretary of State to the American Delegation to the Eighth International Conference of American States (1938) 60). In essence, the US government jealously guarded its sovereignty in matters of conflict and peace. It even opposed the Argentine anti-war treaty at the Seventh International Conference of American States in Montevideo, Uruguay. Instead, the US, being the most industrialized nation-state in the Americas, wanted to stay focused on trade and finance. In these matters, the US could dominate. Tariff reduction, the opening of markets, and spreading US banking and finance interests were all on the table during the Pan-American Conferences.

19  Of course, the US was not the sole dissenter. There were many controversial matters between Latin American states themselves. For example, Bolivia refused to sign the 1923 Pan-American Treaty until Chile renounced the 1904 Treaty of Peace and Friendship. This caused Bolivia to lose access to the Pacific Ocean in the War of the Pacific (1879–84), leaving it a landlocked state (Land-Locked States). The 1904 Treaty solidified the territorial demarcations between the two Andean nations. Bolivia demanded that the Treaty be thrown out, something Chile was reluctant to do. Nonetheless, no Latin American state directly said it would not support such a court. Latin American countries appeared to be in favour of an inter-American Court. The US, however, continued to be the major state hold-out, killing its chances from the start.

20  In the end, a slew of specific courts and policies, ranging from child welfare and road development, sprung up from the conferences. These non-controversial subjects, as the US government called them, were much more acceptable. Even the OAS, created in 1948, is more acceptable to the US than an international tribunal. As one member of the inter-American conferences said of US dominance over institutions such as the OAS, ‘[i]f the United States wanted to badly enough, it could have a resolution passed declaring two and two are five’ (Gruson (1954) 1). The question that emerges is: should Latin America go at it alone? Despite the rancorous relations between Latin American states, those between South–South have borne fruit. In the case of Latin America, this entails strengthening relations with each other or smaller countries outside of the hemisphere. By marginalizing the hegemonic role of the US, Latin American countries have addressed their own issues of conflict and economic development (Ripley (2022)). Maybe an inter-Latin American court would prove to be a more successful creation.

Charles Ripley

Cited Bibliography

• C Calvo, Derecho internacional teórico y práctico de europa y américa vol. 2 (Durand et Pedone-Lauriel 1868).

• HH Bancroft, The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft. History of Central America vol. III 1801–1887 (The History Company 1887).

• M Romero, ‘The Pan-American Conference’ (1890) 151(406) The North American Review 354.

• R Darío, ‘To Roosevelt’ (1903) (translation in public domain) <https://poets.org/poem/roosevelt> (accessed 11 December 2024).

• MC Ramírez, Cinco años en la Corte de Justicia Centroamericana (Lehmann 1918).

• Pan American Union, Fifth International Conference of American States: Special Handbook for the Use of the Delegates (US Government Printing Office Washington DC 1922).

• CB Casey, ‘The Creation and Development of the Pan American Union’ (1933) 13(4) Hispanic American Historical Review 437.

• EG Fay, ‘Rubén Darío in New York’ (1942) 57(8) Modern Language Notes 641.

• S Gruson, ‘US Facing Fight on Anti-Red Plan at Latin Parley; Resolution’s Strong Wording Viewed Askance by Many Delegates at Caracas’ (The New York Times, 1954).

• AM Moreno, La Conferencia de Washington de 1907 y la Corte de Justicia Centroamericana (Publicaciones del Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de El Salvador, La Imprenta República 1957)

• FW Haberman, Nobel Lectures, Peace 1901–1925 (Elsevier 1972).

• LP Argüello, La Corte de Justicia Centroamericana (El Colegio de Abogados de Costa Rica San José 1986).

• F Miller, Latin American Women and the Search for Social Justice (University of New England Press 1991).

• TD Schoonover, The United States in Central America, 1869–1911 (Duke University Press 1991).

• W LaFeber, Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America (W.W. Norton 1993).

• JJ Mearsheimer, ‘The False Promises of International Institutions’ (1995) 19(3) International Security 5–49.

• AR Zamora, Intereses territoriales de Nicaragua: San Andrés y Providencia, Cayos, Golfo de Fonseca, Río San Juan (Fondo Editorial de lo Jurídico 1995).

• MW Doyle, Ways of War and Peace: Realism, Liberalism, and Socialism (W.W. Norton 1997).

• G Best, ‘Peace Conferences and the Century of Total War: The 1899 Hague Conference and What Came After’ (1999) 75(3) International Affairs 619.

• DR Mares, Violent Peace: Militarized Interstate Bargaining in Latin America (Columbia University Press 2001).

• D Healy, James G. Blaine and Latin America (University of Missouri Press Missouri 2002).

• C Marichal, ‘The Construction of Credibility: Financial Market Reform and the Renegotiation of Mexico’s External Debt in the 1880s’ in JL Bortz and SH Haber (eds), The Mexican Economy, 1870–1930: Essays on the Economic History of Institutions, Revolution, and Growth (Stanford University Press 2002) 93.

• L Rosa Bautista, Diplomacia y Literatura En Honduras: Notas de Rafael Leiva Vivas (Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores 2005).

• R Fernández-Retamar, Pensamiento de nuestra América: Autoreflexiones y propuestas (CLACSO 2006).

• HJ Morgenthau, KW Thompson, and DW Clinton, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (7th edn McGraw-Hill Higher Education 2006).

• GC Herring, From Colony to Superpower (OUP 2008).

• C Ripley, ‘The Central American Court of Justice (1907–1918): Rethinking the World’s First Court’ (2018) 19(1) Diálogos: Revista Electrónica de Historia 47.

• A Clemente, ‘De las doctrinas Drago y Haya de la Torre a la “integración solidaria” de Puig: bases teóricas para la integración regional en el pensamiento latinoamericano’ (2020) 33 Estudios Avanzados 28–39.

• CG Ripley, ‘The Rise of South–South Relations: Creating Space for Resistance, Development and Peace in South America’ (2022) 13(2) Latin American Policy 238–57.

Further Bibliography

• RO Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton University Press 1984).

• RO Keohane, ‘Between Vision and Reality: Variables in Latin American Foreign Policy’ in JS Tulchin and RH Espach (eds), Latin America in the New International System (Lynne Rienner 2001) 207–14.

• JJ Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (W.W. Norton 2001).

• RO Keohane and J Nye, Power and Interdependence (4th edn Pearson 2011).

• MP Friedman, ‘Latin American Strategies against US Intervention’ in SM Castro Mariño and ME Crahan (eds), Donald J. Trump y las relaciones Cuba-Estados Unidos en la encrucijada (Orfila Valentini 2018) 211–26.

Cited Documents

• Bryan–Chamorro Treaty (signed 5 August 1914).

• Hague Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes (adopted 18 October 1907, entered into force 26 January 1910) (1907) 205 CTS 233.

• Hague International Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes (adopted 29 July 1899, entered into force 4 September 1900) (1898–99) 187 CTS 410.

• OAS, ‘Our History’ <https://www.oas.org/en/about/our_history.asp> (accessed 8 October 2024).

• OAS, ‘Peace Fund: Fifth International Conference of American States’. <https://www.oas.org/sap/peacefund/VirtualLibrary/virtualLibrary.html#20> (accessed 8 October 2024).

• Office of the Historian, ‘The Secretary of State to the American Delegation to the Eighth International Conference of American States’ (1938) Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, The American Republic, Volume V <https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1938v05/d55#:~:text=You%20may%20add%20that%2C%20if,plenary%20sessions%20of%20the%20conference> (accessed 8 October 2024).

• Pacto De Union Provisional de los Estados de Centro America (approved 1889) Diario Oficial (Nicaragua) No. 88 <http://legislacion.asamblea.gob.ni/normaweb.nsf/($All)/7FAA02D9372F6B56062577BB0070D56A?OpenDocument> (accessed 13 December 2024).

• Pan-American Treaty (signed 3 May 1923).

• Treaty of Peace and Friendship between Bolivia and Chile (adopted 20 October 1904, entered into force 27 March 1905).

• Treaty of Territorial Limits between Costa Rica and Nicaragua (15 April 1858) 48 BSFP 1049 (‘Cañas–Jerez Treaty’).

Further Documents

• Avalon Project Peace Conference at the Hague 1899, ‘Rescript of the Russian Emperor’ (24 August 1898) <https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/hag99-01.asp#:~:text=The%20maintenance%20of%20general%20peace,all%20Governments%20should%20be%20directed> (accessed 8 October 2024).