Human Rights

Human rights are rights inherent to all human beings, whatever our nationality, place of
residence, sex, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, language, or any other status. We are all
equally entitled to our human rights without discrimination. These rights are all interrelated,
interdependent and indivisible.

Introduction to Development of Human Rights

Human rights are the basic freedoms, liberties, and protections to which all persons are entitled.
Human rights are not specific to one government or religion. They do not differ in times of war
or peace. Human rights are constant and inalienable rights, possessed by all people. Ideally,
governments should promote and protect human rights through systems of law.
Today, human rights include life, liberty, and security of person; the freedom of religion,
thought, political expression, movement, assembly, speech, and organization; due process of law,
education, employment, health, property ownership, cultural preservation; the right to marry and
found a family; and freedom from discrimination, unjust punishment, persecution, tyranny, and
oppression.
The modern concept of human rights developed over three centuries. In the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, the concept of natural rights emerged. Natural rights are not subject to any
political, legal, or religious system. They are inalienable rights that humans possess from birth.
The Declaration of Independence (1776) perhaps best summarized natural rights: "all men are
created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among
these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
The concept of natural rights gained popularity during the American and French Revolutions of
the late eighteenth century. Both nations struggled to forge new representative governments that
would best promote the natural rights of citizens. Both nations produced contemporaneous
statements of rights—France, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of Citizens, and
the United States, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
These documents provide the foundation for the modern concept of human rights. However, the
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of Citizens and the Bill of Rights did not extend all natural
rights to all persons. Slavery and indentured servitude continued in fledgling United States and
neither nation extended full rights to women or indigenous populations.
The concept of human rights as it is now understood emerged in the twentieth century
after World War II (1938–1945). Outraged by the horrors of war and the Holocaust, the newly-
formed United Nations addressed issues such as torture, warfare against civilians, the treatment
of prisoners of war, and the prosecution of war criminals, setting forth new rules for warfare that
protected basic rights. In 1948, the member states of the United Nations drafted the United
Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Since the adoption of the declaration, the UN,
national governments, and independent organizations have worked to advance, promote, and
enforce human rights throughout the world. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the
best-known and most widely translated modern statement of human rights.
 A BRIEF HISTORY OF HUMAN RIGHTS

In 539 B.C., the armies of Cyrus the Great, the first king of ancient Persia, conquered the city of
Babylon. But it was his next actions that marked a major advance for Man. He freed the slaves,
declared that all people had the right to choose their own religion, and established racial equality.
These and other decrees were recorded on a baked-clay cylinder in the Akkadian language with
cuneiform [Link] decrees Cyrus made on human rights were inscribed in the Akkadian
language on a baked clay cylinder
The Cyrus Cylinder (539 B.C
Cyrus the Great, the first king of Persia, freed the slaves of Babylon, 539 B.C. Known today as
the Cyrus Cylinder, this ancient record has now been recognized as the world’s first charter of
human rights. It is translated into all six official languages of the United Nations and its
provisions parallel the first four Articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Spread of Human Rights

From Babylon, the idea of human rights spread quickly to India, Greece and eventually Rome.
There the concept of “natural law” arose, in observation of the fact that people tended to follow
certain unwritten laws in the course of life, and Roman law was based on rational ideas derived
from the nature of [Link] asserting individual rights, such as the Magna Carta (1215),
the Petition of Right (1628), the US Constitution (1787), the French Declaration of the Rights of
Man and of the Citizen (1789), and the US Bill of Rights (1791) are the written precursors to
many of today’s human rights documents.
The Magna Carta (1215)
Magna Carta, or “Great Charter,” signed by the King of England in 1215, was a turning point in
human rights. The Magna Carta, or “Great Charter,” was arguably the most significant early
influence on the extensive historical process that led to the rule of constitutional law today in the
English-speaking world.
In 1215, after King John of England violated a number of ancient laws and customs by which
England had been governed, his subjects forced him to sign the Magna Carta, which enumerates
what later came to be thought of as human rights. Among them was the right of the church to be
free from governmental interference, the rights of all free citizens to own and inherit property
and to be protected from excessive taxes. It established the right of widows who owned property
to choose not to remarry, and established principles of due process and equality before the law. It
also contained provisions forbidding bribery and official misconduct.
Widely viewed as one of the most important legal documents in the development of modern
democracy, the Magna Carta was a crucial turning point in the struggle to establish freedom.

Petition of Right (1628)

In 1628 the English Parliament sent this statement of civil liberties to King Charles I. The next
recorded milestone in the development of human rights was the Petition of Right, produced in
1628 by the English Parliament and sent to Charles I as a statement of civil liberties. Refusal by
Parliament to finance the king’s unpopular foreign policy had caused his government to exact
forced loans and to quarter troops in subjects’ houses as an economy measure. Arbitrary arrest
and imprisonment for opposing these policies had produced in Parliament a violent hostility to
Charles and to George Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham. The Petition of Right, initiated by Sir
Edward Coke, was based upon earlier statutes and charters and asserted four principles: (1) No
taxes may be levied without consent of Parliament, (2) No subject may be imprisoned without
cause shown (reaffirmation of the right of habeas corpus), (3) No soldiers may be quartered upon
the citizenry, and (4) Martial law may not be used in time of peace.

United States Declaration of Independence (1776)

In 1776, Thomas Jefferson penned the American Declaration of [Link] July 4, 1776,
the United States Congress approved the Declaration of Independence. Its primary author,
Thomas Jefferson, wrote the Declaration as a formal explanation of why Congress had voted on
July 2 to declare independence from Great Britain, more than a year after the outbreak of the
American Revolutionary War, and as a statement announcing that the thirteen American
Colonies were no longer a part of the British Empire. Congress issued the Declaration of
Independence in several forms. It was initially published as a printed broadsheet that was widely
distributed and read to the public.
Philosophically, the Declaration stressed two themes: individual rights and the right of
revolution. These ideas became widely held by Americans and spread internationally as well,
influencing in particular the French Revolution.

The Constitution of the United States of America (1787) and Bill of Rights (1791)
The Bill of Rights of the US Constitution protects basic freedoms of United States citizens.
Written during the summer of 1787 in Philadelphia, the Constitution of the United States of
America is the fundamental law of the US federal system of government and the landmark
document of the Western world. It is the oldest written national constitution in use and defines
the principal organs of government and their jurisdictions and the basic rights of citizens.
The first ten amendments to the Constitution—the Bill of Rights—came into effect on December
15, 1791, limiting the powers of the federal government of the United States and protecting the
rights of all citizens, residents and visitors in American territory.
The Bill of Rights protects freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to keep and bear
arms, the freedom of assembly and the freedom to petition. It also prohibits unreasonable search
and seizure, cruel and unusual punishment and compelled self-incrimination. Among the legal
protections it affords, the Bill of Rights prohibits Congress from making any law respecting
establishment of religion and prohibits the federal government from depriving any person of life,
liberty or property without due process of law. In federal criminal cases it requires indictment by
a grand jury for any capital offense, or infamous crime, guarantees a speedy public trial with an
impartial jury in the district in which the crime occurred, and prohibits double jeopardy.

Bill of Rights (1791) Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)

In 1789 the people of France brought about the abolishment of the absolute monarchy and set the
stage for the establishment of the first French Republic. Just six weeks after the storming of the
Bastille, and barely three weeks after the abolition of feudalism, the Declaration of the Rights of
Man and of the Citizen (French: La Déclaration des Droits de l’Homme et du Citoyen) was
adopted by the National Constituent Assembly as the first step toward writing a constitution for
the Republic of France. The Declaration proclaims that all citizens are to be guaranteed the rights
of “liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.” It argues that the need for law
derives from the fact that “...the exercise of the natural rights of each man has only those borders
which assure other mmbers of the society the enjoyment of these same rights.” Thus, the
Declaration sees law as an “expression of the general will,“ intended to promote this equality of
rights and to forbid “only actions harmful to the society”.
The First Geneva Convention (1864)

The original document from the first Geneva Convention in 1864 provided for care to wounded
soldiers.
In 1864, sixteen European countries and several American states attended a conference in
Geneva, at the invitation of the Swiss Federal Council, on the initiative of the Geneva
Committee. The diplomatic conference was held for the purpose of adopting a convention for the
treatment of wounded soldiers in combat.
The main principles laid down in the Convention and maintained by the later Geneva
Conventions provided for the obligation to extend care without discrimination to wounded and
sick military personnel and respect for and marking of medical personnel transports and
equipment with the distinctive sign of the red cross on a white background.

The United Nations (1945)

Fifty nations met in San Francisco in 1945 and formed the United Nations to protect and promote
peace.
World War II had raged from 1939 to 1945, and as the end drew near, cities throughout Europe
and Asia lay in smoldering ruins. Millions of people were dead, millions more were homeless or
starving. Russian forces were closing in on the remnants of German resistance in Germany’s
bombed-out capital of Berlin. In the Pacific, US Marines were still battling entrenched Japanese
forces on such islands as Okinawa.
In April 1945, delegates from fifty countries met in San Francisco full of optimism and hope.
The goal of the United Nations Conference on International Organization was to fashion an
international body to promote peace and prevent future wars. The ideals of the organization were
stated in the preamble to its proposed charter: “We the peoples of the United Nations are
determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime
has brought untold sorrow to mankind.”
The Charter of the new United Nations organization went into effect on October 24, 1945, a date
that is celebrated each year as United Nations Day.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has inspired a number of other human rights laws
and treaties throughout the world.
By 1948, the United Nations’ new Human Rights Commission had captured the world’s
attention. Under the dynamic chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt—President Franklin
Roosevelt’s widow, a human rights champion in her own right and the United States delegate to
the UN—the Commission set out to draft the document that became the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights. Roosevelt, credited with its inspiration, referred to the Declaration as the
international Magna Carta for all mankind. It was adopted by the United Nations on December
10, 1948.
In its preamble and in Article 1, the Declaration unequivocally proclaims the inherent rights of
all human beings: “Disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts
which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human
beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been
proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people...All human beings are born free and
equal in dignity and rights.”
The Member States of the United Nations pledged to work together to promote the thirty Articles
of human rights that, for the first time in history, had been assembled and codified into a single
document. In consequence, many of these rights, in various forms, are today part of the
constitutional laws of democratic nations.
Universal Declaration Of Human Rights - An Introduction
On October 24, 1945, in the aftermath of World War II, the United Nations came into being as
an intergovernmental organization, with the purpose of saving future generations from the
devastation of international conflict.

United Nations representatives from all regions of the world formally adopted the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights on December 10, 1948.
The Charter of the United Nations established six principal bodies, including the General
Assembly, the Security Council, the International Court of Justice, and in relation to human
rights, an Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
The UN Charter empowered ECOSOC to establish “commissions in economic and social fields
and for the promotion of human rights….” One of these was the United Nations Human Rights
Commission, which, under the chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt, saw to the creation of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Declaration was drafted by representatives of all regions of the world and encompassed all
legal traditions. Formally adopted by the United Nations on December 10, 1948, it is the most
universal human rights document in existence, delineating the thirty fundamental rights that form
the basis for a democratic society.
Following this historic act, the Assembly called upon all Member Countries to publicize the text
of the Declaration and “to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally
in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of
countries or territories.”
Today, the Declaration is a living document that has been accepted as a contract between a
government and its people throughout the world. According to the Guinness Book of World
Records, it is the most translated document in the world.