| Summary/Abstract |
In the Spitsbergen treaty of 1920, Norway acquired sovereignty over the Spitsbergen Islands. Rather than Woodrow Wilson, the American president, the architects behind the treaty were Robert Lansing, Wilson’s secretary of state, and, behind the diplomatic scene, the mining investor, John M. Longyear. In 1906, Longyear established a mining company to exploit the coal deposits at Spitsbergen. He induced Congress, the State Department, and the White House to forge an American policy for the European Arctic, including the appointment of Lansing, an international lawyer, as a counsel in the State Department. Lansing was a leading expert on both international law and the lack of state authority at the terra nullius, Spitsbergen. In 1915, he became secretary of State and, at the Paris Peace Conference, decided American policy regarding the Spitsbergen question. This analysis shows how the outcome of the Spitsbergen question was a result of American mining interests, supplemented by Norwegian-American shared interests in conflict resolution based on international law.
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