Bernard Cornelis Johannes Loder (13
September 1849, Amsterdam – 4 November 1935, The Hague) was a Dutch jurist. He sat on the Supreme Court of the
Netherlands from 1908 to 1921. He then sat as a judge of
the Permanent
Court of International Justice from 1921 to 1930, serving as
the first president of that court from 1921 to 1924. Born in 1849, Bernard
Loder studied law in Amsterdam at the Athenaeum Illustre of
Amsterdam, the predecessor to the University of Amsterdam,
and afterward studied at University of Leiden. He
was interested in the study of international law and in particular maritime law. Loder sat on the Supreme Court of the
Netherlands from 1908 to 1921. In 1920, he served on the committee that drew up
the Statute of the Permanent Court of International Justice. He
was a judge of that court from
1921 to 1930, serving as its first president until 1924. He represented
the Netherlands at international conferences on maritime law
in 1905, 1909, 1910, and 1923. He served as one of the Dutch delegates at
the Paris Peace Conference in
1919. In 1897, Loder was one of the founders of the International
Maritime Committee, the functions of which were later taken on by the International
Maritime Organization. Loder became a member of the Institut de Droit
International in 1921 and served as its president and four
years later President at its 33rd meeting in The Hague. Bernard Loder was married in 1877 and had two
daughters. He died in 1935 in The Hague.