History of Human Rights
One defends the liberties
1. Cyrus Cylinder (539 BC)
 recognized as the world’s first charter
of human rights
 an ancient clay cylinder, on which is
written a declaration in Akkadian
cuneiform script in the name of Persia's
Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great
 Cyrus the Great, the first king of ancient
Persia, freed the slaves, declared that
all people had the right to choose their
own religion, and established racial
equality
 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
2. Magna Carta (1215)
 King John of England (and his
predecessors), the 3rd of the Angevin
Kings, ruled the kingdom using the
principle of vis et voluntas, or "force
and will", taking executive and
sometimes arbitrary decisions, often
justified on the basis that a king was
above the law
 In 1214, a mercenary army raised by
King John was defeated by the French
at the Battle of Bouvines in northern
France. This army had been paid largely
by the tax known as ‘scutage’, a
payment made to the Crown in place of
providing knights for military service,
and the focus of much baronial
discontent.
 In 1215, John pledged to his barons that
he would obey “the law of the land”
when he affixed his seal to a charter
that came to be called Magna Carta
 Although Magna Carta contained 63
clauses when it was first granted, only
three of those clauses remain part of
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English law.
and rights of the English Church,
another confirms the liberties and
customs of London and other towns
and the third clause gave all free men
the right to justice and a fair trial
 Magna Carta has been taken as
foundational to the rule of law, chiefly
because in it King John promised that
he would stop throwing people into
dungeons whenever he wished, a
provision that lies behind what is now
known as due process of law and is
understood not as a promise made by a
king but as a right possessed by the
people
 “No free man shall be seized or
imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or
possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or
deprived of his standing in any other
way, nor will we proceed with force
against him, or send others to do so,
except by the lawful judgment of his
equals or by the law of the land. To no
one will we sell, to no one deny or delay
right or justice.”
3. Petition of Right (1628)
 Following a series of disputes with
Parliament over granting taxes, in 1627
Charles I imposed "forced loans", and
imprisoned those who refused to pay,
without trial.
 Parliament found this to be a violation
of the spirit of the Magna Carta, which
provided that the monarch could not
levy taxes without common consent or
imprison a free man without cause, and
thus drafted the Petition to reclaim the
rights of Parliament and of free men
and to extract a recommitment from
the crown to observe the rule of law.
 The Petition of Right, initiated by Sir
Edward Coke, was based upon earlier
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 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.
4. English Bill of Rights (1689)
 The English Bill of Rights was an act
signed into law in 1689 by William III
and Mary II, who became co-rulers in
England after the overthrow of King
James II. The bill outlined specific
constitutional and civil rights and
ultimately gave Parliament power over
the monarchy
 The English Bill of Rights includes the
following items:
(a) A list of King James’ misdeeds
(b) 13 articles that outlined specific
freedom
(c) Confirmation that William and Mary
were rightful successors to the
throne of England
 In general, the Bill of Rights limited the
power of the monarchy, elevated the
status of Parliament and outlined
specific rights of individuals.
 Some of the key liberties and concepts
laid out in the articles include:
(a) Freedom to elect members of
Parliament, without the king or
queen’s interference
(b) Freedom of speech in parliament
(c) Freedom from royal interference
with the law
(d) Freedom to petition the king
(e) Freedom to bear arms for self-
defense
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(f) Freedom from cruel and unusual
punishment and excessive bail
(g) Freedom from taxation by royal
prerogative, without the agreement
of Parliament
(h) Freedom of fines and forfeitures
without a trial
(i) Freedom from armies being raised
during peacetimes
5. United States Declaration of Independence
(1776)
 On July 4, 1776, the United States
Congress approved the Declaration of
Independence as a formal explanation
of why Congress had voted 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.
 Substantially abandoning contention on
the basis of the rights of Englishmen,
the declaration put forth the more
fundamental doctrines of natural rights
and of government under social
contract.
 Philosophically, the Declaration
stressed two themes: individual rights
and the right of revolution.
6. The Constitution of the United States of
America (1787)
 Signed on September 17, 1787, by
delegates to the Constitutional
Convention in Philadelphia, the
Constitution of the United States
established America’s national
government and fundamental laws, and
guaranteed certain basic rights for its
citizens
 One of the key features in the
Constitution, and one that would
become a critical factor in the
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 nineteenth century, is that the source
of sovereignty, the source of the
authority for the document, is the
citizenry. “We the People of the United
States” ordain and establish the
Constitution. This is a direct link to the
Declaration of Independence, which
declared that governments derive their
legitimacy from the consent of the
governed.
7. French 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.
 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 members 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.”
8. US Bill of Rights (1791)
 In 1789, Madison, then a member of
the newly established U.S. House of
Representatives, introduced 19
amendments to the Constitution. On
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September 25, 1789, Congress adopted
12 of the amendments and sent them
to the states for ratification. Ten of
these amendments, known collectively
as the Bill of Rights, were ratified and
became part of the Constitution on
December 10, 1791.
 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.
9. The First Geneva Convention (1864)
 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.
 It defines "the basis on which rest the
rules of international law for the
protection of the victims of armed
conflicts.
 The main principles laid down in the
Convention and maintained by the later
Geneva Conventions are:
(a) relief to the wounded without any
distinction as to nationality;
(b) neutrality (inviolability) of medical
personnel and medical
establishments and units; and
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 (c) respect for and marking of medical
personnel transports and
equipment with the distinctive sign
of the red cross on a white
background
10. The United Nations (1945)
 The traumatic events of the Second
World War brought home that human
rights are not always universally
respected. The extermination of almost
17 million people during the Holocaust,
including 6 million Jews, horrified the
entire world. After the war,
governments worldwide made a
concerted effort to foster international
peace and prevent conflict. This
resulted in the establishment of the
United Nations in June 1945.
 In April 1945, delegates from fifty
countries met in San Francisco for the
United Nations Conference on
International Organization with the goal
to fashion an international body to
promote peace and prevent future
wars.
 The Charter of the United Nations was
signed on 26 June 1945, in San
Francisco, at the conclusion of the
United Nations Conference on
International Organization, and came
into force on 24 October 1945.
 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.”
11. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(1948)
 In 1948, representatives from the 50
member states of the United Nations
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came together under the guidance of
Eleanor Roosevelt (First Lady of the
United States 1933-1945) to devise a
list of all the human rights that
everybody across the world should
enjoy.
 On 10 December 1948, the General
Assembly of the United Nations
announced the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights (UDHR) - 30 rights and
freedoms that belong to all of us. Seven
decades on and the rights they included
continue to form the basis for all
international human rights law.
 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 UDHR marked an important shift by
daring to say that all human beings are
free and equal, regardless of colour,
creed or religion. For the first time, a
global agreement put human beings,
not power politics, at the heart of its
agenda.
 The 30 rights and freedoms set out in
the UDHR include the right to asylum,
the right to freedom from torture, the
right to free speech and the right to
education. It includes civil and political
rights, like the right to life, liberty, free
speech and privacy. It also includes
economic, social and cultural rights, like
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 the right to social security, health and
education.
 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.
4. Inherent
PRINCIPLES OF HUMAN RIGHTS
1. Universality
 Everyone is born with and possesses
the same rights, regardless of where
they live, their gender or race, or their
religious, cultural or ethnic background.
 It applies to all the people/objects in a
particular group, without any exception
 rights can be enforced without a
national border
2. Inalienability
 human rights cannot be taken away
from a person, it is absolute and cannot
be diminished
 These rights are not transferable or
nullified
 XPN: Rights may be alienated or
diminished but must be done according
5. Indivisible
to due process
 Ex.: the right to liberty may be
restricted if a person is found guilty of a
crime by a court of law
3. Imprescriptibility
 Human rights are imprescriptible
because they cannot be lost even by a
long passage of time.
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 Man does not lose his rights even if he
fails to use or assert them.
 Included in the Declaration of the Rights
of Man and of the Citizen (1789,
France), it was expressly mentioned
that these imprescriptible rights are the
right to liberty, property, safety and
resistance against oppression.
 Ex.: a man’s right to liberty is not lost
even if he had been arbitrarily detained
by the authorities. He does not lose
such right even if he fails to claim it
 Human rights are inherent as they are
not granted by any person or authority,
irrespective of their caste, creed,
religion, sex, and nationality.
 They do not need any event for their
existence
 human rights persist without the need
of any written instrument or declaration
for their existence
 The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (UDHR) in 1994 defines human
rights as “inherent dignity and of the
equal and inalienable rights of all
members of the human family is the
foundation of freedom, justice and
peace in the world”
 Human rights when guaranteed by a
constitution are known as
“Fundamental Rights”, as a written
constitution is a fundamental law of the
state.
 All human rights are indivisible
 one set of rights cannot be enjoyed fully
without the other
 It is indivisible and interdependent
because all rights – political, civil, social,
cultural and economic – are equal in
importance and none can be fully
enjoyed without the other
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  Consequently, all human rights have
equal status, and cannot be positioned
in a hierarchical order. Denial of one
right invariably impedes enjoyment of
other rights.
6. Interdependent
 The fulfillment or exercise of one
cannot be had without the realization
of the others.
 The indivisibility principle recognizes
that if a government violates rights such
as health, it necessarily affects people’s
ability to exercise other rights such as
the right to life.
 Human rights are interdependent and
interrelated. Each one contributes to
the realization of a person’s human
dignity through the satisfaction of his or
her developmental, physical,
psychological and spiritual needs. The
fulfilment of one right often depends,
wholly or in part, upon the fulfilment of
others.
7. Fundamental
 Without human rights the life and
dignity of man will be meaningless.
 At first there were no human rights, if
you were in the right crowd you were
safe, if you weren’t then you weren’t.
This is a common practice during the
reign of ancient egyptian pharaohs, that
when a person is a slave he will die as a
slave.
 According to the United Nations there
are a total of 30 human rights, and
these rights should apply to everyone,
in order to give meaning to the life and
dignity of a man.

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