CHAP. V] TREATY RELATIONS 1155 
Australian Colonies should be accorded the treaty power 
and given the status of neutral powers under the same 
Crown as the United Kingdom. The substance of their 
recommendations ! was as follows :— 
VICTORIA 
[11. Neutrality of the Colonies in War 
13. Tt has been proposed to establish a Council of the 
Empire, whose advice must be taken before war was declared. 
But this measure is so foreign to the genius and traditions of 
the British Constitution, and presupposes so large an aban- 
donment of its functions by the House of Commons, that we 
dismiss it from consideration. There remains, however, we 
think, more than one method by which the anomaly of the 
present system may be cured. . . . 
19. The Colony of Victoria, for example, possesses a 
separate Parliament, Government, and distinguishing flag ; 
a separate naval and military establishment. All the publi 
appointments are made by the Local Government. The 
only officer commissioned from England who exercises 
authority within its limits is the Queen’s Representative ; 
and in the Ionian Islands, while they were admittedly a 
Sovereign State, the Queen’s Representative was appointed 
in the same manner. The single function of a Sovereign 
State, as understood in International Law, which the Colony 
does not exercise or possess, is the power of contracting 
obligations with other states. The want of this power alone 
distinguishes her position from that of states undoubtedly 
sovereign. 
20. If the Queen were authorized by the Imperial Parlia- 
ment to concede to the greater Colonies the right to make 
treaties, it is contended that they would fulfil the conditions 
constituting a Sovereign State in as full and perfect a sense 
as any of the smaller states cited by public jurists to illustrate 
this rule of limited responsibility. And the notable conces- 
sion to the interest of peace and humanity made in our own 
day by the Great Powers with respect to privateers and to 
merchant shipping renders it probable that they would not, 
on any inadequate grounds, refuse to recognize such states 
as falling under the rule. 
* Parl. Pap., 1870, Sess. 2, ii. 247; cf. contra Higinbotham, Debates, 
x. 690 seq. Messrs. Kerferd, G. Berry, and Gavan Duffy all signed this 
part of the report.