The Hague Conference provided that an attempt should be made to codify these laws into a fixed system, and the representatives of the nations met in London in 1908, under the presidency of the Earl of Desart, for this purpose.

The outcome of their two months' deliberations was that document of seven chapters and seventy articles which has ever since been known as the Declaration of London.

Here at last was the thing for which the world had been waiting so long--a complete system of maritime law for the regulation of belligerents and the protection of neutrals, which would be definitely binding upon all nations because all nations were expected to ratify it.
But the work of all these learned gentlemen was thrown away.

The United States was the only party to the negotiations that put the stamp of approval upon its labours.

All other nations declined to commit themselves.