THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE
 
PROVISIONS OF THE PROPOSALS
 
        The Dumbarton Oaks Proposals provide that: (1) an                                           .
international court of justice should be established as
the principal judicial organ of the Organization;
(2) the court should have a statute which should be an-
nexed to the Charter of the Organization; (3) all members
of the Organization should ipso facto be parties to the
statute; (4) states not members of the Organization should
be permitted to become parties to the statute upon condi-
tions laid down by the General Assembly upon recommendation 
by the Security Council; and (5) the statute should be 
either (a) the statute of the present Permanent Court of 
International Justice with such modifications as may be 
desirable, or (b) a new statute based upon the present 
Statute.
 
PRESENT STATUS OF THE PROBLEM
 
        It was suggested informally during the Conversations 
that prior to the United Nations Conference a preliminary 
meeting of jurists be held for the purpose of drafting 
the statute of the court and formulating plans for its 
establishment, to be submitted to that conference. No 
definite agreement was reached on this suggestion, and 
there was no detailed discussion of the content of the 
proposed statute nor of the possible means by which it 
might be put into effect. The United States delegation 
handed informally to the other delegations a tentative 
revised draft of the Statute of the Permanent Court of 
International Justice as a possible basis for future con-
sideration.
 
        The preliminary meeting of Jurists, and, subsequently, 
the Conference, will therefore be faced with complex legal 
and practical problems resulting from the fact that the 
Permanent Court of International Justice is still an 
organization in being, and that the adoption either of a 
new statute or a revision of the present Statute will 
necessarily involve the interests of states which will 
not be initial members of the organization. These include 
eight enemy states or states under armistice, and six 
neutral states. Since no decision was reached during the 
Conversations on the time for the proposed meeting of 
jurists, on its composition, or on its terms of reference,
 
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