615 et seq.), and arbitration at the present time is purely voluntary. The subject is very fully dealt with in the Code de Procédure Civile (arts. 1003-1028). The submission to arbitration (compromis) must, on pain of nullity, be acted upon within three months from its date (art. 1007). The submission terminates (i.) by the death, refusal, resignation or inability to act of one of the arbitrators; (ii.) by the expiration of the period agreed upon, or of three months if no time had been fixed; (iii.) by the disagreement of two arbitrators, unless power be reserved to them to appoint an umpire (art. 1012). An arbitrator cannot resign if he has once commenced to act, and can only be relieved on some ground arising subsequently to the submission (art. 1014). Each party to the arbitration is required to produce his evidence at least fifteen days before the expiration of the period fixed by the submission (art. 1016). If the arbitrators, differing in opinion, cannot agree upon an umpire (tiers arbitre), the president of the Tribunal of Commerce will appoint one, on the application of either party (art. 1017). The umpire is required to give his decision within one month of his acceptance of the appointment; before making his award, he must confer with the previous arbitrators who disagreed (art. 1018). Arbitrators and umpire must proceed according to the ordinary rules of law, unless they are specially empowered by the submission to proceed as amiables compositeurs (art. 1019). The award is rendered executory by an order of the president of the Civil Tribunal of First Instance (art. 1020). Awards cannot be set up against third parties (art. 1022), or attacked by way of opposition. An appeal against an award lies to the Civil Tribunal of First Instance, or to the court of appeal, according as the subject-matter, in the absence of arbitration, would have been within the jurisdiction of the justice of the peace, or of the Civil Tribunal of First Instance (art. 1023). In the manufacturing towns of France, there are also boards of umpires (Conseils de Prud’hommes) to deal with trade disputes between masters and workmen belonging to certain specified trades.
Other Foreign Laws.—The provisions of French law as to arbitration are in force in Belgium (Code de Proc. Civ., arts. 1003 et seq.); and a convention (8th of July 1899) between France and Belgium regulates, inter alia, the mutual enforcement of awards. The law of France has also been reproduced in substance in the Netherlands (Code of Civil Procedure, arts. 620 et seq.). The German Imperial Code of Procedure did not create any system of arbitration in civil cases. But this omission was supplied in Prussia by a law of the 29th of March 1879, which provided for the appointment, in each commune, of an arbitrator (Schiedsmann) before whom conciliation proceedings in contentious matters might be conducted. The procedure was gratuitous and voluntary; and the functions of the arbitrator were not judicial; he merely recorded the arrangement arrived at, or the refusal of conciliation. This law was followed in Brunswick by a law of the 2nd of July 1896, and in Baden by a law of the 16th of April 1886. In Luxemburg, compulsory arbitration in matters affecting commercial partnerships was abolished in 1879 (law of the 16th of April 1879). A system of conciliation, similar to the Prussian, exists in Italy (laws of the 16th of June 1892, and the 26th of December 1892) and in some of the Swiss cantons (law of the 29th of April 1883). Spain (Code of Civil Proc., arts. 1003-1028; Civil Code, arts. 1820-1821) and Sweden and Norway (law of the 28th of October 1887) have followed the French law. In Portugal, provision has been made for the creation in important industrial centres, on the application of the administrative corporations, of boards of conciliation (decrees of the 14th of August 1889, and the 18th of May 1893).}
Authorities.—Russell, Arbitration (London, 1906); Annual Practice (London, yearly); Redman, Arbitration (London, 1897); Crewe, Arbitration Act of 1889 (London, 1898); Pollock, On Arbitrators (London, 1906). As to Scots law: Bell, On Arbitration (2nd ed., Edinburgh, 1877); Erskine, Principles (20th ed., Edinburgh, 1903). As to American law: Morse, Law of Arbitration (Boston, 1872). As to foreign law generally: the texts of the laws cited, and the Annuaire de législation étrangère. (A. W. R.)
ARBITRATION, INTERNATIONAL. International arbitration is a proceeding in which two nations refer their differences to one or more selected persons, who, after affording to each party an opportunity of being heard, pronounce judgment on the matters at issue. It is understood, unless otherwise expressed, that the judgment shall be in accordance with the law by which civilized nations have agreed to be bound, whenever such law is applicable. Some authorities, notably the eminent Swiss jurist, J. K. Bluntschli, consider that unless this tacit condition is complied with, the award may be set aside. This would, however, be highly inconvenient since international law has never been codified. A fresh arbitration might have to be entered on to decide (1) what the law was, (2) whether it applied to the matter in hand. Arbitration differs from Mediation (q.v.) in so far as it is a judicial act, whereas Mediation involves no decision, but merely advice and suggestions to those who invoke its aid.
Arbitral Tribunals.—An international arbitrator may be the chief of a friendly power, or he may be a private individual. When he is an emperor, a king, or a president of a republic, it is not expected that he will act personally; he may appoint a delegate or delegates to act on his behalf, and avail himself of their labours and views, the ultimate decision being his only in name. In this respect international arbitration differs from civil arbitration, since a private arbitrator cannot delegate his office without express authority. The analogy between the two fails to hold good in another respect also. In civil arbitration, the decision or award may be made a rule of court, after which it becomes enforceable by writ of execution against person or property. An international award cannot be enforced directly; in other words it has no legal sanction behind it. Its obligation rests on the good faith of the parties to the reference, and on the fact that, with the help of a world-wide press, public opinion can always be brought to bear on any state that seeks to evade its moral duty. The obligation of an ordinary treaty rests on precisely the same foundations. Where there are two or any other even number of arbitrators, provision is usually made for an umpire (French sur-arbitre). The umpire may be chosen by the arbitrators themselves or nominated by a neutral power. In the “Alabama” arbitration five arbitrators were nominated by the president of the United States, the queen of England, the king of Italy, the president of the Swiss Confederation, and the emperor of Brazil respectively. In the Bering Sea arbitration there were seven arbitrators, two nominated by Great Britain, two by the United States, and the remaining three by the president of the French Republic, the king of Italy, and the king of Sweden and Norway respectively. In neither of these cases was there an umpire; nor was any necessary, since the decision, if not unanimous, lay with the majority. (See separate articles on Bering Sea Arbitration and "Alabama" Arbitration.)
Arbitral tribunals may have to deal with questions either of law or fact, or of both combined. When they have to deal with law only, that is to say, to lay down a principle or decide a question of liability, their functions are judicial or quasi-judicial, and the result is arbitration proper. Where they have to deal with facts only, e.g. the evaluation of pecuniary claims, their functions are administrative rather than judicial, and the term commission is applied to them. “Mixed commissions,” so called because they are composed of representatives of the parties in difference, have been frequently resorted to for delimitation of frontiers, and for settling the indemnities to be paid to the subjects of neutral powers in respect of losses sustained by non-combatants in times of war or civil insurrection. The two earliest of these were nominated in 1794 under the treaty negotiated by Lord Grenville with Mr John Jay, commonly called the “Jay Treaty,” their tasks being (1) to define the boundary between Canada and the United States which had been agreed to by the treaty signed at Paris in 1783; (2) to estimate the amount to be paid by Great Britain and the United States to each other in respect of illegal captures or condemnation of vessels during the war of the American Revolution.
Although arbitrations proper may be thus distinguished from “mixed commissions,” it must not be supposed that any hard or fast theoretical line can be drawn between them. Arbitrators strictly so called may (as in the “Alabama” case) proceed to award damages after they have decided the question of liability; whilst “mixed commissions,” before awarding damages, usually have to decide whether the pecuniary claims made are or are not well founded.
Awards.—International awards, as already pointed out, differ from civil awards in having no legal sanction by which they can be enforced. On the other hand, they resemble civil awards in that they may be set aside, i.e. ignored, for sufficient reason, as, for example, if the tribunal has not acted in good faith, or has not given to each party an opportunity of being heard, or has exceeded its jurisdiction. An instance under the last head occurred in 1831, when it was referred to the king of the Netherlands as sole arbitrator to fix the north-eastern boundary of the state of Maine. The king’s representatives
