The Permanent Court of International Justice, often called the World Court, was an international court attached to the League of Nations. Created in 1922 (although the idea of an international court was several centuries old), the Court was initially met with a good reaction from states and academics alike, with many cases submitted to it for its first decade of operation. With the heightened international tension of the 1930s the Court was used with decreasing regularity; by a resolution by the League of Nations on 18 April 1946, the Court ceased to exist, being replaced by the International Court of Justice.
The Court's mandatory jurisdiction came from three sources; the Optional Clause of the League of Nations, general international conventions and special bipartite international treaties. Cases could also be submitted directly by states, but they were not bound to submit material unless it fell into those three categories. The Court could issue either judgments or advisory opinions; judgments were directly binding, while advisory opinions were not. In practice member states of the League of Nations followed advisory opinions anyway, fearing that to not do so could undermine the moral and legal authority of the Court and League. On occasion the Court was accused of extending its jurisdiction; strictly speaking only allowed to intervene in matters of international law, the Court became involved in municipal law during the Loans Cases.
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