The United States and the Geneva Protocol of 1924: “A New Holy Alliance”?

Abstract

DURING the decade following I920 the relations of Latin America with the League of Nations were a source of worry and concern to the American government. In particular, the Department of State feared Latin American efforts to use the League as a countervailing force against United States policy in the Western Hemisphere. The Department was immoderately hostile, consequently, to any League participation in hemisphere affairs; it even forced the exclusion of League observers from the Pan-American Conferences of I923 and I928. The American posture was, in fact, only one facet of a general policy: to have nothing to do with the League in political matters. For its part, the League generally reacted to United States policy with restraint and caution and only became active in Latin America during the i930's, when Washington eventually welcomed League efforts to settle the Leticia and Chaco disputes.' In the I920's, however, the League's interest in disarmament led it inadvertently to take a step that American officials regarded as a serious threat to the isolation of the Western Hemisphere from the League, and thus in turn a threat to the unique position of the United States in the area. This step was the drafting of the Geneva Protocol of I924, a treaty viewed by official circles in Washington as an unfriendly European concert. Indeed, Secretaries of State Charles Evans Hughes and Frank B. Kellogg both regarded the Protocol as a potential new Holy Alliance. Hoping to strengthen those elements in Europe that opposed it, therefore, the secretaries manifested their opposition to the treaty. The American position had considerable influence on the failure of the Protocol; some commentators have argued that the United States was mainly responsible for its demise. The European powers directly concerned sought to fill the resulting vacuum with the Locarno agreements. The United