League of Nations

The League of Nations was an international organization founded after the First World War at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. The League's goals included disarmament; preventing war through collective security; settling disputes between countries through negotiation and diplomacy; and improving global welfare. The diplomatic philosophy behind the League represented a fundamental shift in thought from the preceding hundred years. The old philosophy, growing out of the Congress of Vienna (1815), saw Europe as a shifting map of alliances among nation-states, creating an equilibrium of power maintained by strong armies and secret agreements. Under the new philosophy, the League was a government of governments, with the role of settling disputes between individual nations in an open and legalist forum. The impetus for the founding of the League came from Democratic U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, but, along with many other countries, the United States never joined the League of Nations.

Origins

The concept of a peaceful community of nations had previously been described in Immanuel Kant?s Perpetual Peace. The idea of the actual League of Nations appears to have originated with British Foreign Secretary Edward Grey, and it was enthusiastically adopted by the Democratic U.S. President Woodrow Wilson and his advisor Colonel Edward M. House as a means of avoiding bloodshed like that of World War I. The creation of the League was a centrepiece of Wilson's Fourteen Points for Peace, specifically the final point: "A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike." Wilson was a strong advocate of including the League in the Treaty of Versailles.

Related Topics:
Immanuel Kant - Perpetual Peace - British Foreign Secretary - Edward Grey - Democratic - U.S. President - Woodrow Wilson - Colonel - Edward M. House - Fourteen Points for Peace - Treaty of Versailles

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The Paris Peace Conference accepted the proposal to create the League of Nations (French: Société des Nations, German: Völkerbund) on January 25, 1919. The Covenant of the League of Nations was drafted by a special commission, and the League was established by Part I of the Treaty of Versailles, which was signed on June 28 1919. Initially, the Charter was signed by 44 states, including 31 states which had taken part in the war on the side of the Triple Entente or joined it during the conflict. Despite Wilson's efforts to establish and promote the League, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919, the United States neither ratified the Charter nor joined the League due to opposition from isolationists in the U.S. Senate, especially influential Republican leader Henry Cabot Lodge, together with Wilson's refusal to compromise.

Related Topics:
French - German - January 25 - 1919 - June 28 - State - Triple Entente - Nobel Peace Prize - United States - Ratified - Isolationists - U.S. Senate - Republican - Henry Cabot Lodge

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The League held its first meeting in London on 10 January 1920. Its first action was to ratify the Treaty of Versailles, officially ending World War I. The headquarters of the League soon moved to Geneva, where the first general assembly of the League was held on November 15, 1920.

Related Topics:
London - 10 January - 1920 - Treaty of Versailles - Geneva - November 15

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