It is the affirmation of an unqualified right.

It is one of those declarations of principle which sounds true, which in the abstract may be true, and which appeals strongly to man's innate sense of moral right and to his conception of natural justice, but which, when the attempt is made to apply it in every case, becomes a source of political instability and domestic disorder and not infrequently a cause of rebellion.
In the settlement of territorial rights and of the sovereignty to be exercised over particular regions there are several factors which require consideration.

International boundaries may be drawn along ethnic, economic, geographic, historic, or strategic lines.

One or all of these elements may influence the decision, but whatever argument may be urged in favor of any one of these factors, the chief object in the determination of the sovereignty to be exercised within a certain territory is national safety.

National safety is as dominant in the life of a nation as self-preservation is in the life of an individual.