Table Of ContentTHE OAS AND THE PROMOTION
AND PROTECTION OF HUMAN
RIGHTS
THE OAS AND THE PROMOTION
AND PROTECTION OF HUMAN
RIGHTS
by
LA WRENCE J. LEBLANC
MARTINUS NIJHOFF-THE HAGUE-1977
© 1977 by Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands
All rights reserved, including the right to translate or to
reproduce this book or parts thereofi n any form
ISBN 978-94-011-8695-7 ISBN 978-94-011-9514-0 (eBook)
DOl 10.1007/978-94-011-9514-0
CONTENTS
List of Figures and Tables VI
Preface VII
I. INTRODUCTION
II. INTER-AMERICAN OBLIGATIONS ON HUMAN RIGHTS 6
III. WHAT ARE HUMAN RIGHTS? 25
IV. THE IACHR: ITS ORIGINS AND ORGANIZATION 41
V. THE IACHR AND THE PROMOTION OF HUMAN RIGHTS 69
VI. THE IACHR AND THE PROTECTION OF HUMAN RIGHTS 91
VII. CONCLUSION 169
Appendix: The A merican Declaration oft he Rights and
Duties of Man 172
Index 177
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES
Figure 2.1 Structure of the Organization of American States (1951-1970) 7
Figure 2.2 Structure of the Organization of American States (I97O-Present) 8
Table 4.1 MembersoftheIACHR,1960-1975 61
Table 5.1 Votes cast in the Council of the OAS on the special voting pro
cedure proposed for Article 9 (0, and on both options proposed in
that paragraph 75
PREFACE
This book is a product of my long-standing interest in international action on
human rights, an interest which I developed as a graduate student and which
I have maintained as a teacher and researcher. I am indebted to Professor
Vernon Van Dyke of the University of Iowa for stimulating my interest in the
subject and for guiding the preparation of my Ph.D. thesis, of which this book
is a greatly revised and expanded version. I should also like to express my ap
preciation to Professor A. Glenn Mower, Jr., of Hanover College, and to my
colleague Glenn N. Schram, both of whom read the thesis and made many
helpful suggestions when I began to revise it for publication. The book is im
proved as a result of their efforts, though I alone remain responsible for any
errors of fact or interpretation.
Most of the research on the book was done at the Columbus Memorial
Library of the OAS in Washington, D.C., and I am grateful to the librarians
there for kind and efficient assistance. The Marquette University Committee
on Research provided me with a research grant for the summer of 1974 and
supplementary grants in 1975 and 1976 which facilitated the completion of
the manuscript: I am grateful for this assistance. I have endeavored to include
all material available to me as of the end of March, 1976.
I should like to thank Mary Scopp and Peggy Schaus for their expert
secretarial assistance. Finally, I should like to express my appreciation to my
wife, Mary, without whose help I would never have been able to complete the
manuscript. This book is fondly dedicated to her.
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
International action to protect what we today call "human rights" has oc
curred through the centuries. Agitation to suppress the slave trade, for exam
ple,dates back to the seventeenth century-though it was not until the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries that treaties were adopted to suppress the
traffic and ultimately to abolish slavery itself. During the same period conven
tions on the law of war were adopted and laid down rules on such matters as
the treatment of prisoners of war and civilian populations. Peace treaties con
cluded at the close of World War I as well as various provisions of the Cove
nant of the League of Nations had implications for the treatment of
minorities. Immediately after World War I the International Labor Organiza
tion was created: and it has devoted itself to reducing hours of work, ensuring
health and safety standards, promoting collective bargaining, and other
programs for workers.
These as well as other developments prior to World War II were to have
important implications for human welfare. Moreover, they led to an alteration
of the conception of international law held by some international lawyers. As
Evan Luard has observed. "Nearly all nineteenth-century lawyers. whether
or not they followed positivist doctrines ...• would have denied that
governments were under any special obligations concerning the treatment of
their own subjects within their own jurisdiction". In the 1920's and 1930's
however, "the opinion of some international lawyers changed on this point. It
began to be held that individuals, as well as states, were the subjects of inter
nationallaw".l Nevertheless, such measures as were adopted on human rights
prior to World War II, as the examples cited above suggest. were adopted
sporadically and usually were directed towards the elimination of specific
practices such as slavery and maltreatment of minorities. It is mainly since
World War II that efforts have been made to provide comprehensive protec
tion to all individuals against all forms of injustice.
I Evan Luard (ed.), The International Protection of Human Rights (New York: Frederick A.
Praeger, 1967), p. 20. See generally the essay by Luard. "The Origins of International Concern
Over Human Rights," pp. 7-21.
2 INTRODUCTION
Interest in providing comprehensive protection to all persons in all nations
in the post World War II period was stimulated by the disregard for human
rights by Nazi and Fascist regimes. Atrocities committed under those regimes
demonstrated that governments which disregard the rights of their own
citizens are not likely to treat the citizens of other states differently; more
broadly, they led many to see a relationship between respect for human rights
and peace. This relationship was stressed in various wartime declarations and
proposals. The Atlantic Charter, for example, expressed the hope that the
destruction of Nazism would make it possible for all nations to exist in peace
with one another, and that all peoples within all nations would be able to live
their lives in freedom from fear and want. These aspirations were incor
porated in the United Nations Declaration of January, 1942. In addition, the
Dumbarton Oaks proposals on the United Nations anticipated a role for the
organization in the promotion of respect for human rights; the drafters of the
Charter followed through by listing the promotion of respect for human rights
among the purposes and principles of the United Nations in Article 1 (3). Ar
ticle 55 of the Charter goes further to state that "the United Nations shall
promote ... universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fun
damental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, language or
religion." In Article 56, "all members lof the United Nations \ pledge
themselves to take joint and separate action in cooperation with the
organization for the achievement of the purposes set forth in Article 55."
The drafters of the charters of the major regional international governmen
tal organizations created at the close of World War II also manifested an in
terest in taking action on behalf of human rights. Article 3 of the Statute of
the Council of El!rope establishes respect for human rights as a condition of
membership, providing in part that "Every Member of the Council of Europe
must accept the principles of the rule of law and the enjoyment by all persons
within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms ...."
Numerous references to human rights were included in the Charter of the
Organization of American States (OAS), including one (Article 13 of the
original Charter; Article 16 of the revised Charter) which provides that "Each
State has the right to develop its cultural, political and economic life freely
and naturally. In this free development, the State shall respect the rights of the
individual and the principles of universal morality."
The states who have ratified the United Nations Charter, the Charter of the
OAS, or the Statute of the Council of Europe have, by virtue of provisions
such as those discussed above, recognized that human rights are a matter of
international concern and have assumed international obligations on them.
But the obligations are vague; nowhere do these instruments clearly identify
the rights which are to be promoted or respected. It was for this reason that
those who advocated international action on human rights pressed hard in the
post-war years for the adoption of declarations, covenants, and conventions
INTRODUCTION 3
which would give greater meaning to obligations already assumed, or would
create new, more meaningful obligations.
Many have been adopted. The United Nations General Assembly adopted
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. In the ensuing years it
has adopted, and thus opened for ratification, numerous conventions and
covenants, some of which deal with specific subjects such as racism and the
rights of women, and two of which, adopted in 1966, are of a more general
nature: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (and an Op
tional Protocol to it), and the International Covenant on Economic, Social.
and Cultural Rights. In 1950 the Council of Europe adopted the European
Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.
and it has since been ratified by the great majority of member states and has
entered into force. The European Social Charter, which has also entered into
force, affirms a group of rights commonly referred to as economic. social, and
cultural rights. In 1948 the American states adopted the American Declara
tion of the Rights and Duties of Man; in 1969 the American Convention on
Human Rights was adopted and thus opened for ratification by member
states of the OAS.
Numerous international human rights agencies have also been created.
though they differ from each other in terms of their structure, functions. and
the degree of independence and objectivity with which they have performed
their tasks. Examples include the United Nations Commission on Human
Rights created by the Economic and Social Council in 1946: the European
Commission and Court of Human Rights which function as organs of im
plementation of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fun
damental Freedoms; and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
(IACHR), created by resolution of the Fifth Meeting of Consultation of
Ministers of Foreign Affairs in 1959. (To these one could add a number of
well known non-governmental organizations which have been active in the
field of human rights, e.g., the International Commission of Jurists and
Amnesty International.) Still others might be created. The International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, if it enters into force, would lead to
the creation of a Human Rights Committee; a commission and a court would
function as organs of implementation of the American Convention on Human
Rights if it enters into force.
International action on human rights is thus not confined to either the
global or regional levels of international relations. Instead, there has occurred
a broad attack in defense of human rights on both levels, with the activities of
various agencies in the United Nations, the Council of Europe, and the OAS
complementing, reinforcing, and sometimes conflicting with one another.
These activities could have important implications for human welfare. They
also raise important foreign policy questions for states. Is it enough to declare
human rights a matter of international concern and to proclaim the rights
