Reflections on UN Declaration of Human Rights

This year, 2008, is specially notable because it is the sixtieth anniversary of the adoption and Proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the General Assembly of the United Nations Organization on December 10th., 1948.

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Even before the formation of the United Nations Organization, and the promulgation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in December 1948, the Institute of International Law, in its session held in New York on October 12th., 1929, adopted an International Declaration of the Rights of Man which is of particular interest today. The Declaration reads as follows:

“The Institute of International Law, considering that the juridic conscience of the civilized world demands the recognition of the individual’s rights exempted from all infringement on the part of the State;

That the Declaration of Rights inscribed in a great many constitutions and notably in the American and French constitutions of the end of the eighteenth century, enacted laws not only for the citizen, but for the human being;

That the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States declares that no State shall ‘deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of the law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws’;

That the Supreme Court of the United States, in a unanimous decision, ruled that, by the terms of this amendment, it applied within the jurisdiction of the United States, ‘to all persons without distinction of race, colour or nationality, and that the equal protection of the laws is a guarantee of the protection of equal laws’;

That, moreover, a certain number of treaties explicitly provided for the recognition of the rights of man;

That it is all important to spread throughout the entire world the international recognition of the rights of man;

Proclaims:

Article 1
It is the duty of every State to recognize for every individual the equal right to life, liberty and property and to accord to every one on its territory the full and complete protection of the law without distinction of nationality, sex, race, language or religion.

Article 2
It is the duty of every State to recognize for every individual the right to the free exercise, both public and private, of every faith, religion or belief of which the practice is not incompatible with public policy and good morals;

Article 3
It is the duty of every State to recognize the right of every individual to the free use of the language of his choice and for instruction in this language;

Article 4
No motive whatsoever based directly or indirectly on differences of sex, race, language or religion can authorize a State to refuse to any of its nationals private and public rights and especially the admission to institutions of public instruction and the exercise of different economic activities, professions and industries;

Article 5
The equality already provided is not to be nominal but really effective and excludes all discrimination, direct or indirect;

Article 6
No State has the right to withdraw, except for reasons taken from its legislation, its nationality from those who for reasons of sex, race, language or religion it might wish to deprive of the rights guaranteed by the preceding articles.”

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