ABSTRACT
The general opinion of those who are interested in either the theoretical or practical consideration of world-organization for the maintenance of peace is at the present time clearly favourable to the kind of union which German writers call a Zweckerband. Federation may mean a union of one or other of two radically different kinds. The federated states irrevocably cease to be respectively separate political communities. Federation means a treaty of alliance for a particular object or objects which is intended to be permanent; as the result of which the contracting states, while severally retaining their separate political existence, are thenceforth regarded as a permanent confederacy of states. In regard to a federation of the kind proposed by Kant, it is to be observed that it leaves the measures to be taken for the prevention of war to the several separate states acting in accordance with their obligations under the treaty which has been entered into between them.
