544 DOC. 334 S T A T E M E N T S AT I CI C and the Secretariat of the League of Nations would be able, when notified in time, to assist in obtaining a collective visa for groups of professors and students coming to Geneva. In view of the statements made by certain delegations to the Conference, it was to be hoped that this facility would finally be granted more or less automatically. M. de Re y n o l d wished to know how far in advance it was necessary to send such requests to the Secretariat. Colonel H ia m said that it depended on circumstances. For a country adjacent to Switzerland Germany, for example 24 hours might be sufficient. For a journey from Poland to Geneva several visas were required, and a fortnight might be necessary. M. E in s t e in said that savants who had experienced difficulty in obtaining a visa often asked him to use his influence with the competent authorities. Could not the establishment of a body of savants be considered who would approach the competent authorities with a [8] view to facilitating the journeys of professors and students ? [9] Colonel H ia m replied that the Secretariat would willingly welcome any co-operation of savants in the various countries, but M. Einstein might not be fully aware of certain other difficulties which might arise, apart from the question of the period required for obtaining the various formalities. M. E in s t e in quoted the case of a German student who had desired to go to Roumania and who had had difficulty in obtaining a passport. Under the system which he had proposed, an association of savants would exist in Roumania which would give the necessary guarantees for the student in question and would undertake to obtain the visa for him. M. de Ko w a l s k i drew attention to the fact that visas were given in legations and that it was therefore in the country in which the legation was established that action would have to be taken. He quoted an example of the difficulties which frequently arose. A Pole who had gone to Switzerland could not then obtain from the Italian legation a visa to go to Italy. Such difficulties might interrupt or hinder the research work of savants who found it necessary for their work to go from one centre to another. The attention of the Governments might be drawn to the possibility of putting an end to these difficulties by a system of reciprocal Published in League 1926c, pp. 29, 31-32, and 34. [84 709]. [1]Einstein made these statements at the fifth meeting of the eighth session of the ICIC, held on 28 July 1926. [2]This statement formed part of the discussion on the “Scheme for an International Universities Association,” in which the feasibility of the formation of an international association of universities was considered. In the discussion, the advisability of whether to recommend the creation of national associations in countries where none existed was examined. [3]Hendrik A. Lorentz. Robert Bárány. These statements formed part of a discussion on the plan for the establishment of an “International School for Higher Political Studies.” The ICIC was discuss- ing a draft resolution on the issue, submitted by the subcommittee on university relations, which read: “The Sub-Committee, after having heard the statement of M. Barany concerning the creation of an international university and recalling the previous resolution of the Committee on Intellectual Co- operation on this subject, considers it extremely desirable that an international school for higher polit- ical studies should be instituted. “It instructs the International Institute for Intellectual Co-operation to examine the possibilities of putting the scheme into practice and of discovering what result could be achieved by co-ordinating the national and international organisations already in existence, in conformity with the steps taken in this direction in the various countries” (see League 1926c, p. 64). For Einstein’s statement on the plan for an international university at the previous discussion of the matter by the ICIC, see Doc. 33. [4]Émile Borel (1871-1956) was Professor of Theory of Functions at the University of Paris and member of the French National Assembly. [5]Gonzague de Reynold (1880-1970) was Professor of French Literature at the University of Bern. [6]Józef Wierusz-Kowalski (1866-1927) was a Polish physicist and diplomat and Poland’s ambas- sador to Vienna. [7]Jules Destrée (1863-1936) was a Belgian socialist politician, lawyer, art critic, member of the
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