That state of affairs came about when Britain finally gave up its resistance to the principles, first formulated by Empress Catherine in 1780, and acquiesced in the 1856 Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law, which enshrined "free ship makes free goods" and rejecting "enemy ship makes enemy goods."
In the 20th century, the new principle became part of the broader body of laws of the sea currently embodied in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, as Woodrow Wilson advocated in Point 2 of his Fourteen Points (see Freedom of the seas).