Editing League of Nations (section)

==Demise and legacy==
[[File:18-IV-1946.png|right|thumb|500px|World map showing [[member states of the United Nations]] (in green and blue) and [[member states of the League of Nations]] (in green and red) on 18 April 1946, when the League of Nations ceased to exist]] [[File:Humanités Numériques.JPG|thumb|right|League of Nations archives, Geneva<ref>League of Nations archives, United Nations Office in Geneva. Network visualization and analysis published in {{Cite journal| volume = 10| issue = 3| last = Grandjean| first = Martin| title = La connaissance est un réseau| journal = Les Cahiers du Numérique| access-date = 15 October 2014| date = 2014| pages = 37–54| url = http://www.cairn.info/resume.php?ID_ARTICLE=LCN_103_0037| doi = 10.3166/lcn.10.3.37-54| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150627140457/http://www.cairn.info/resume.php?ID_ARTICLE=LCN_103_0037| archive-date = 27 June 2015| url-status=live| df = dmy-all}}</ref>]]
As the situation in Europe escalated into war, the Assembly transferred enough power to the Secretary General on 30 September 1938 and 14 December 1939 to allow the League to continue to exist legally and carry on reduced operations.{{sfn|Magliveras|1999|p=31}} The headquarters of the League, the [[Palace of Nations]], remained unoccupied for nearly six years until the Second World War ended.{{sfn|Scott|1973|p=399}}

At the 1943 [[Tehran Conference]], the Allied powers agreed to create a new body to replace the League: the United Nations. Many League bodies, such as the International Labour Organization, continued to function and eventually became affiliated with the UN.<ref name="ILO"/> The designers of the structures of the United Nations intended to make it more effective than the League.{{sfn|Northedge|1986|pp=278–280}}

The final session of the League of Nations concluded on 18 April 1946 in Geneva.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Chaudron |first1=Gerald |title=New Zealand in the League of Nations: The Beginnings of an Independent Foreign Policy, 1919–1939 |date=8 November 2011 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-0-7864-8898-8 |page=257 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i-iQlwIDn0AC |language=en}}</ref><ref>[http://worldatwar.net/timeline/other/league18-46.html League of Nations Chronology] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041230095126/http://worldatwar.net/timeline/other/league18-46.html |date=30 December 2004 }} Philip J. Strollo</ref> Delegates from 34 nations attended the assembly.{{sfn|Scott|1973|p=404}} This session concerned itself with liquidating the League: it transferred assets worth approximately $22,000,000 (U.S.) in 1946<ref name="SyracuseHerald">
"League of Nations Ends, Gives Way to New U.N.", ''Syracuse Herald-American'', 20 April 1946, p. 12
</ref> (including the Palace of Nations and the League's archives) to the UN, returned reserve funds to the nations that had supplied them, and settled the debts of the League.{{sfn|Scott|1973|p=404}} [[Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood|Robert Cecil]], addressing the final session, said:

{{blockquote|Let us boldly state that aggression wherever it occurs and however it may be defended, is an international crime, that it is the duty of every peace-loving state to resent it and employ whatever force is necessary to crush it, that the machinery of the Charter, no less than the machinery of the Covenant, is sufficient for this purpose if properly used, and that every well-disposed citizen of every state should be ready to undergo any sacrifice in order to maintain peace ... I venture to impress upon my hearers that the great work of peace is resting not only on the narrow interests of our own nations, but even more on those great principles of right and wrong which nations, like individuals, depend.<br />
[[The king is dead, long live the king!|The League is dead. Long live the United Nations.]]{{sfn|Scott|1973|p=404}}
}}

The Assembly passed a resolution that "With effect from the day following the close of the present session of the Assembly [i.e., April 19], the League of Nations shall cease to exist except for the sole purpose of the liquidation of its affairs as provided in the present resolution."<ref name=Myers>{{cite journal | author = Denys P. Myers | title  = Liquidation of League of Nations Functions | journal = The American Journal of International Law | volume = 42 | issue  = 2 | year = 1948 | pages = 320–354 | doi=10.2307/2193676| jstor  = 2193676 | s2cid = 146828849 }}</ref> A Board of Liquidation consisting of nine persons from different countries spent the next 15 months overseeing the transfer of the League's assets and functions to the United Nations or specialised bodies, finally dissolving itself on 31 July 1947.<ref name=Myers/> The archive of the League of Nations was transferred to the [[United Nations Office at Geneva]] and is now an entry in the [[UNESCO]] [[Memory of the World Register]].<ref name="unog">{{cite web|url=http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=26995&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html|title=League of Nations Archives 1919–1946|publisher=UNESCO Memory of the World Programme|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080930100726/http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID%3D26995%26URL_DO%3DDO_TOPIC%26URL_SECTION%3D201.html|archive-date=30 September 2008|access-date=7 September 2009}}</ref>

In the Assembly's last session in 1946, [[Philip Noel-Baker]] (representing the United Kingdom) remarked that failure to act as soon as a great power had invaded another state had ultimately doomed the League: "We know the World War began in Manchuria 15 years ago...Manchuria, Abyssinia, Munich have killed another great illusion, the belief that [[appeasement]], seeking the national interest at the expense of others, individual action, secret bargains, could bring us peace."<ref>BECK, PETER J. "The League of Nations and the Great Powers, 1936-1940." World Affairs, vol. 157, no. 4, 1995, pp. 175–89. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20672433. Accessed 28 July 2024.</ref>

In the past few decades, by research using the League Archives at Geneva, historians have reviewed the legacy of the League of Nations as the United Nations has faced similar troubles to those of the interwar period. Current consensus views that, even though the League failed to achieve its ultimate goal of world peace, it did manage to build new roads towards expanding the [[rule of law]] across the globe; strengthened the concept of [[collective security]], giving a voice to smaller nations; helped to raise awareness to problems like [[epidemics]], [[slavery]], [[child labour]], colonial tyranny, [[refugee|refugee crises]] and general working conditions through its numerous commissions and committees; and paved the way for new forms of statehood, as the [[mandate system]] put the colonial powers under international observation.<ref name="Pedersen2007">{{cite journal|last1=Pedersen|first1=Susan| author1-link = Susan Pedersen (historian) |title=Back to the League of Nations|journal=The American Historical Review|volume=112|issue=4|pages=1091–1117|date=October 2007|publisher=American Historical Review |jstor=40008445 |doi=10.1086/ahr.112.4.1091}}</ref> Erez Manela situated the League as a catalyst for transforming the postwar global order into one critical of the arrangements of empire.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Manela |first=Erez |url=https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780195176155.001.0001 |title=The Wilsonian Moment |date=2007-07-23 |publisher=Oxford University PressNew York, NY |doi=10.1093/oso/9780195176155.001.0001 |isbn=978-0-19-517615-5}}</ref> Alternatively, Laura Robson & Joe Maiolo posit the argument that the [[League of Nations mandate|Mandate System]] under the League was a re-vitalised form of imperialism that placed former colonies under the ownership of greater powers.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Makar |first1=A. B. |last2=McMartin |first2=K. E. |last3=Palese |first3=M. |last4=Tephly |first4=T. R. |date=June 1975 |title=Formate assay in body fluids: application in methanol poisoning |url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1 |journal=Biochemical Medicine |volume=13 |issue=2 |pages=117–126 |doi=10.1016/0006-2944(75)90147-7 |issn=0006-2944 |pmid=1}}</ref>

Professor [[David M. Kennedy (historian)|David Kennedy]] portrays the League as a unique moment when international affairs were "institutionalised", as opposed to the pre–First World War methods of law and politics.{{sfn|Kennedy|1987}}

The principal Allies in the Second World War (the UK, the USSR, France, the U.S., and the [[Republic of China (1912–49)|Republic of China]]) became permanent members of the [[United Nations Security Council]] in 1946; in 1971, the [[China|People's Republic of China]] replaced the Republic of China (then only in control of [[Taiwan]]) as a permanent member of the [[UN Security Council]], and in 1991 the [[Russian Federation]] assumed the seat of the dissolved USSR. Decisions of the Security Council are binding on all members of the UN, and unanimous decisions are not required, unlike in the League Council. Only the five permanent members of the Security Council [[United Nations Security Council veto power|can wield a veto]] to protect their vital interests.{{sfn|Northedge|1986|pp=278–281}}