The Dominican Republic

In the good old days when it was the privilege of a country to govern itself as badly as it chose, and when constitutional restraints seemed an unreasonable burden upon elements of the people seeking more immediate reform, it was accepted that civil war was a purely domestic problem with which third states had no right to interfere. 1 Not only had third states no right to interfere, but they had a duty to see to it that their territory did not become a base for a military expedition in favor of the rebels or a source of supply for arms and munitions of war. Neither the Havana Convention on the Duties and Rights of States in the Event of Civil Strife of 1928 nor the Protocol of 1957 contained any provision looking to collective interference in the civil strife itself. Now and then the United States, acting unilaterally under the Monroe Doctrine, took sides; but that met with the general condemnation of "intervention." Treaties and conventions in favor of mediation and conciliation might apply to controversies between states, but they had no application to the factions engaged in a civil war. Let them fight it out, and whoever won and whatever his principles, third states recognized him as the de jure government as soon as his control of the situation appeared to be stable

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• The Dominican Case

  Open Access•R T Bohan•American Journal of International…•1966

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• Appraising a Century of Scholarship in the American Journal of International Law

  Open Access•David J Bederman•American Journal of International…•2006

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