Chris and Gernot, (Sorry, I meant to send this yesterday , and it got mismailed)
I would draw your attention to our comrade attorney Ann Fagan Ginger who has for decades advocated that U.S. lawyers raise international law claims, including especially UN declaration of human rights claims, in U.S. domestic courts. She tracks where U.S. lawyers have followed this theory, and publishes a compendium of such cases. US has adopted much of UN law by treaty. By US Constitution, treaties have same legal status as federal statutes. Ergo, UN rights are U.S. law of the land. This is the basic legal theory. Ginger founded the Berkeley city peace commission. Ginger's many books and articles on international law, UN law, especially peace law ,can be found at http://www.mcli.org/ <http://www.mcli.org/> Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute <http://www.mcli.org/index.html <http://www.mcli.org/index.html> > Home "Challenging" Book Using the Law Projects Support Contact About Order Welcome, Berkeley Daily Planet readers, please go here for Reports. New Book "Challenging U.S. Human Rights Violations Since 9/11" Report by Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute Ann Fagan Ginger, Editor Prometheus Books, March 2005 Listen to Ann Fagan Ginger, as reported by Alameda Report on September 25, 2004. Both video and audio tapes are available.The broadest coverage of human rights violations ever attempted will appear as a new book, "Challenging U.S. Human Rights Violations Since 9/11" in March 2005, to be published by Prometheus Books. This book will be submitted as a Report to the Office of Inspector General of the U.S. State Department in Washington and to the United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights. After carefully collecting and sorting all of the violations by all U.S. Government agencies since 9/11, MCLI editors enunciated 28 categories of rights and duties being violated. By May 1 of this year, 160 reports were written and put into a category. The revelations of the attacks on Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison required several more Reports. The book will lay out new paths to action for concerned people to take against a particular violation, from suing to filing a complaint with the Office of Inspector General to reporting to the three UN human rights reporting committees -- always invoking the Mobilization of Shame that has proved so effective, from South Africa to East Timor. Read more about this book in this Summer 2004 Human Rights Now! newsletter. This publication can be pre-ordered. FALL 2004 Human Rights Now! The latest newsletter is now available. Help support MCLI's mission by subscribing to this quarterly newsletter. Past issues are available. COMING EVENTS IN 2004 Check where and when Ann Fagan Ginger will speak on human rights. NEW REPORTS Administration Delinquent in Filing Three Required Reports to the UN After 9/11, the Administration did not file any of the reports required under three human rights treaties ratified by the U.S. Senate in 1992 and 1994. One City's Commissions Made Required Reports to Department of State The Miami police department received federal funding to quell demonstrators expected at rallies against the Free Trade in America Agreement (FTAA). The Miami city officials made the request in advance and made a report afterward to the federal government on how the money was spent - on riot gear, pepper spray, rubber bullets, extra police forces, etc. Four laws for civil and political rights and against discrimination and police misconduct in the United States. Steps to take to file a report on a violation of human rights or peace law. Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute (MCLI) seeks to promote social change by increasing the recognition and use of existing human rights and peace law at the local, national, and international levels. Search MCLI Site MCLI Web MCLI has been a non-profit corporation since 1965 and depends on the financial contributions and volunteer time of people who support its mission and work. Please join us! Get on our new mailing list. Sign up to receive news from MCLI. Chris Burford > * Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2004 19:46:32 -0000 ________________________________ They (see G Kohler's comments below) would be my sympathies too. To extend the bourgeois democratic pressure for human rights, which can take a purely individualised legal form, to the actual concrete struggle for rights, in the actual context of people's lives. You note some points already on the record (below). It might be necessary to unpack these and consider separately how far each of them can be pushed. I note for example you say the right to full employment is contained in the 1948 UN Declaration. This sounds similar to the "right to work" which left wingers campaigned for in the 30's. One of the most controversial rights under capitalism. In the globalised world it might need adapating to the right to work in reasonable jobs at reasonable rates of pay. I do think that the overall theme for global campaigns has to be one of "common humanity" and some would see this as diluting a specifically class-based appeal to the working class. But I think openings need to be taken to make such campaigns particularly relevant for working class and working people, as well as the perhaps billion people who are in marginalised jobs in terms of the global capitalist economy, and are semi-lumpen. Or "under-employed" to use more neutral economic terminology. Chris Burford ----- Original Message ----- From: "g kohler" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2004 4:00 PM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] economics and class struggle behind legal victory. > From: Chris Burford Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2004 . . . snip> As for working > people - working class and self-employed workers on the land > - a > more radical agenda of human rights is to their advantage, but there > is a downside in that it ultimately tends to emphasise atomised > individualised rights, . . . > > > Reply: > Wouldn't it make sense to campaign for *economic* human rights in > order to gain ground in the legal sphere? Many of the economic human > rights have already been catalogued in the 1948 UN Declaration, > including the right to a decent standard of living, full employment, > no child labour, no discrimination against women, and the right to a > social order that facilitates those other rights. One could add the > right of not being exploited. Since economic human rights can only be > realized in a collective manner, the argument of "atomized, > individualized" does not apply to economic human rights. Workers and > poor people of the world unite for what? > Could be: unite for your economic human rights. That sits also well > with the theme of a common humanity, as raised by Lebowitz in a recent > posting. > GK > economics and class struggle behind legal victory * From: g kohler <[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > * Date: Mon, 20 Dec 2004 22:43:39 -0500 ________________________________ As I had it handy, I am attaching an excerpt from the 1948 UN Declaration of Human Rights, namely the articles dealing with economic rights. As an example, it could be argued that anything and everything the Zapatistas have been doing to date has been within the scope of the economic human rights catalogued in this declaration. Gernot xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx from the 1948 UN Declaration of Human Rights - Economic Rights (articles 17, 22 - 25) Article 17. (1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property. Article 22. Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality. Article 23. (1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment. (2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work. (3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection. (4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests. Article 24. Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay. Article 25. (1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control. (2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection. in reply to: ------------------------------- To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: economics and class struggle behind legal victory. From: Chris Burford Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2004 ---> snip
