by Mark Oettinger , Esq .
Design and Implementation of a World Court of Human Rights
The Role and Jurisdiction of a World Court of Human Rights
The World Court of Human Rights ( the Court , or the WCHR ) is designed to adjudicate selected , eligible , human rights cases where judicial review may be sought by affected individuals , or classes of individuals , who are found by the Court to have standing . The cases accepted for adjudication by the Court will be decided , in part , in accordance with the United Nations human rightsrelated conventions , and their case law , all of which have evolved from the United Nations ’ December 10 , 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights ( UDHR ). The cases before the Court will also be adjudicated in accordance with the broader body of regional human rights conventions , and their case law , and in accordance with generally accepted human rights custom , practice , jurisprudence and scholarship .
The work of the Court will create and illuminate a consistent and cohesive body of substantive human rights law , through a uniform , comprehensive and efficient global judicial process . In so doing , the WCHR will promote worldwide awareness of , respect for , and compliance with , the everevolving “ world law ” of human rights .
A Brief History of the Project
The idea of a World Court of Human Rights arguably first emerged in the 1970s . Globalist Garry Davis had renounced his United States citizenship in 1948 , and spent the last 65 years of his life advocating for a “ world without borders ,” arguing that it is the existence of nation-states that makes war possible . He was widely recognized as “ World Citizen No . 1 ,” and he lived out his days , engaged until the end , at age 91 , in South Burlington , Vermont . His obituary is one of the very few that have been run on the front page of the New York Times . See New York Times , July 29 , 2013 Page 1 .
Garry , and a Chicago-based international human rights lawyer , Louis Kutner , produced a ( very ) rough draft of a statute for a court that proposed to adjudicate matters of “ world law .” Their vision was arguably naive from the standpoint of public international law , because , after all , there is ( as yet ) no “ world law .” That said , there is a growing body of public international law that is evolving from the confluence of the increasing proliferation of bilateral and multilateral treaties ... which can credibly be argued to constitute an incipient body of world law . As Garry confronted his final battle with cancer , he asked me to travel to India in order to participate in the annual meeting of the world ’ s chief justices in Lucknow , India . I should advance , he said , his vision of a “ World Court .” I agreed to go , with an agenda limited to advancing a World Court of Human Rights .
With this background , I attended the 14th annual meeting the World Chief Justices , in Lucknow , India , held December 13-17 , 2013 . The goal of the trip was to propose to the Chief Justices that , if they thought the project worthy , we would assemble a high-level committee of experts on public international law , human rights law , and judicial systems , and produce a proposed Statute for a World Court of Human Rights . The reaction was 100 % enthusiastic , and so , while essentially “ between jobs ,” I spent the first several months of 2014 drafting , and repeatedly redrafting , the proposed Statute of the World Court of Human Rights . Because the Chief Justices met annually in Lucknow , India , we have grown accustomed to calling it , The Treaty of Lucknow .
To draft the Treaty , we assembled a Design Team , and we convened a series of video conferences , and conducted four months of essentially full-time research , in order produce the present draft . The Design Team was composed of a mixture of judges , lawyers , academics , practitioners and nonprofits . We used the statutes and practices of the International Court of Justice ( ICJ ), the European Court of Human Rights ( ECHR ), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights ( IACHR ), and the African Commission on Human and Peoples ’ Rights ( ACHPR ), as guidance . The structures and missions of each of these bodies is different , but each sheds light on the requirements , demands and limitations of the characteristics of a “ supranational ” court that would be necessary to fulfill such a task .
The video conferences were recorded and archived , and links to the video records of those meetings can be found , on the Archived Meetings page of our website . See www . worldcourtofhumanrights . net . It is important to mention that the proposed Statute is continuously susceptible of improvement . We therefore encourage all interested parties to explore the many international human rights resources that have been assembled on our website ( and elsewhere ), to watch the archived meetings of the De- sign Team , and to post comments and suggestions through the interactive Comments page of the website . All comments are gratefully considered by the Design Team .
At their 15th annual meeting , in Lucknow , India , held December 12-16 , 2014 , I reported on the team ’ s work , and distributed pocket-sized copies of the Statute to the conference attendees . At the conclusion of the conference , the World Chief Justices issued a unanimous Resolution which provided , inter alia , that , “ The Heads of State / Government of all countries be urged ... to hold a high level meeting to deliberate on the measures required for creating ... a World Court of Human Rights ...” The full text of the Chief Justices ’ Resolution can be found at the following link http :// www . cmseducation . org / article51 / resolutions . htm .
In January 2015 , we traveled to New York City , to begin the process of advancing the Treaty of Lucknow through a United Nations ’ treaty accession process . Then , in March 2015 , we traveled to Washington DC to meet with Vermont ’ s three US Congressional delegations and a leading NGO in the field of international human rights . We informed them of our work , and we solicited their support for advancing the World Court of Human Rights .
I returned to Lucknow , India , for the third time , in October 2015 , for the 16th annual meeting of the World Chief Justices . Their support was undimmed , but since a country ’ s accession to a treaty invariably depends upon the willingness of the executive branch to initiate , and typically , the legislative branch to confirm , the country ’ s accession to the treaty , the support of the country ’ s judiciary is helpful , but in no way sufficient , to ensure the country ’ s accession to the treaty . In addition , I found no examples of chief justices who had made the encouraged overtures to their countries ’ chief executives , as there is a general propensity for judges to eschew interaction with the executive and legislative branches , for traditional reasons of separation of powers .
Frequently Asked Questions
Question : Should the WCHR be a United Nations organ , like the International Court of Justice ( ICJ )?
Answer : The strong view of the Design Team is , “ No .” This is not to take anything away from the ICJ , which is a vibrant and ef-
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