Introduction

Abstract

On August 15, 1804 the Emperor of the French and the Elector and Arch-Chancellor of the Holy Roman Empire concluded the Convention sur l’octroi de navigation du Rhin, which created the first of the Rhine River Commissions.¹ This diplomatic instrument deserves mention not only because of the institution it created but because of the spirit in which it was drafted. The Convention created the first modern permanent supra-national administration with functional powers which, while somewhat limited in scope, were far-ranging in concept. Simultaneously, the Convention removed control of Rhine River navigation from the sovereign domain of states and placed that control in the hands of an international commission which exercised powers beyond those comprehended by the present Central Commission for the Navigation of the Rhine.²