60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

December 10^th marks the 60^th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This blog post is dedicated to that important document.

"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: its Origin, its Evolution, and its Promise," was the title of a presentation given by Professor Paul Magnarella at Warren Wilson College this past Monday evening. Professor Magnarella is the Director of Peace & Justice studies for Warren Wilson College. These are my notes from the presentation:

FDR gave a famous speech in 1941 called the ‘Four Freedoms’ speech. He proposed that all people should have freedom of speech, freedom to worship as one chooses, and freedom from fear and freedom from want. These freedoms formed the basis for a human rights agenda.

In 1945, the UN charter was ratified by 60 countries. Today, there are 190+ countries that have ratified the UN charter. In 1946, Eleanor Roosevelt chaired a Commission on Human Rights. It was an aspirational, not a legally binding document, but it was the first international document to promote the dignity of all people around the world. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, for the first time, said that all human rights – civil, cultural, economic, political, social, were recognized for all people, everywhere. Discrimination or mistreatment is not allowed for race, color, sex, religion, language political or other opinions, property, birth or other status.

Articles 3 – 31 cover civil and political rights. Articles 22 – 27 cover economic, social, and cultural rights, including the right to participate in cultural life of the community. Articles 28 – 29 cover the right to social and international order and the duty to respect the rights and dignity of others.

Some countries have made the Universal Declaration of Human Rights part of their constitutions, and that means the Universal Declarations have reached the stage of customary law. So far, this Universal Declaration and other covenants have not been ratified by the US Congress; therefore they cannot be invoked in a court of law.

Individuals can submit complaints to the UN Human Rights Committee after exhausting local and national avenues of redress – but this is not true in the USA.

Items included under the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights include the right to an adequate standard of living, health, education, food, family, life, housing, social security, and water. This has been ratified by 156 countries, but not by the USA.

Other Human Rights Conventions include the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination: convention against torture and other degrading treatment; and convention on elimination of discrimination against women. The USA has not ratified this convention.

The Convention on Rights of the Child – the USA and Somalia are the only two countries who have not ratified this convention. And that is the last of my notes on Professor Magnarella’s talk.

From the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights webpage:

THE UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS TURNS 60

As the world celebrates the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on 10 December, High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay says the historic document offers hope for the future and urges continuous efforts to make the Declaration a reality to all. More ...

And, in an email from Center for Constitutional Rights, they talk about how they are promoting human rights in two court cases right here in the USA:

Today, CCR argued the case of innocent Canadian rendition victim Maher Arar in federal court. Maher was changing planes at JFK on his way home when he was sent to Syria to be tortured, interrogated and kept in a tiny underground cell for a year - the U.S. officials responsible, including John Ashcroft and FBI head Robert Mueller, want to keep his case out of court.

Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear the case of Jamal Iqbal, one of hundreds of Muslim, Arab and South Asian men rounded up in the New York area after 9/11 based on their religion and race. Ashcroft v. Iqbal is a companion case to CCR's class action, Turkmen v. Ashcroft, on behalf of the men swept up on minor immigration charges and kept in abusive conditions until they were cleared of any connection to terrorism. Muslim immigrants were treated as guilty of terrorism until proven innocent, and again, the U.S. officials responsible want to keep the case out of court.

As they say in their email “Accountability must be a cornerstone to any human rights agenda.” Here in the USA, we clearly have a long way to go.