Mack, Kathryn S.

Sohn, Louis B.

Vogelson, Jay M.

English

Southern Methodist University

PERSPECTIVE:SECTION TRIBUTE TO THE UNITED NATIONSWORKING GROUP ON IMPROVING THEEFFECTIVENESS OF THE UNITED NATIONSReport on Improving the Effectivenessof the United Nations in Advancing theRule of Law in the WorldIntroductionFor the past fifty years the American Bar Association has played an activerole in supporting the United Nations in its role of promoting international peaceand security. In 1943, before the Dumbarton Oaks and San Francisco conferences,Reginald Heber Smith, one of the great leaders of the American Bar Association,arranged a series of conferences of leading lawyers and international law profes-sors throughout the United States and, with the cooperation of the Canadian BarAssociation, in Canada. Judge Manley Hudson, assisted by Louis Sohn, con-ducted these conferences. They resulted in a volume published jointly by the ABAand CBA in 1944, entitled "International Law of the Future," which contained avariety of proposals. Some of the proposals became provisions in the Charterof the United Nations.Following this tradition, the Section of International Law and Practice pre-pared this report as a contribution to the fiftieth anniversary of the UnitedNations in 1995. Five separate working groups were formed to deal with fiveimportant issues of international law. (For the membership of these groups,see Appendix A.) These issues are crucial to the maintenance of international294 THE INTERNATIONAL LAWYERpeace, security and justice, and to the fulfillment of Goal VIII of the AmericanBar Association-to advance the rule of law in the world.These issues are:* settlement of international disputes, with emphasis on the preparation bythe United States of a draft declaration accepting the jurisdiction of the Interna-tional Court of Justice;* establishment of an International Criminal Court for the punishment of indi-viduals responsible for gross violations of international law;* international protection of human rights, with emphasis on the strengtheningof the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights;e arms control and disarmament, with emphasis on the nonproliferation ofnuclear weapons and the banning of all nuclear test explosions;0 peacekeeping, with emphasis on the establishment of a standby militaryforce composed of units from national military forces to be available on callby the Security Council under conditions carefully defined in agreements to beconcluded pursuant to article 43 of the United Nations Charter.The recommendations set forth herein were approved by the House of Delegatesat the American Bar Association 1994 Annual Meeting, and accordingly, repre-sent the policy of the American Bar Association.While certain of the issues discussed in this report have been previously consid-ered by the American Bar Association, it is important at this crucial moment-when the United Nations is starting to plan for the next few decades-to reempha-size a few important issues and to present the United States government withsuggestions how they might be solved.At the same time, it proved necessary to deal only incidentally with someother issues on which the American Bar Association has already adopted basicresolutions. In particular, the issue of U.S. contributions to the expenses of theUnited Nations has been the subject of several resolutions of the House of Dele-gates, which, for instance, in August 1992, strongly urged that "the executiveand legislative branches of the United States government pay immediately and infull the United States' debt to the United Nations for its regular and peacekeepingexpenses." Some of the steps proposed in this report might enlarge the expensesof the United Nations. In the long run, however, the result is likely to be thatthe considerable expenses of the United States for the maintenance of internationalpeace, security, and justice and to advance the rule of law, democracy, andhuman rights would be taken over by the United Nations, and the external expensesof the United States for these purposes would be drastically diminished, as theywould be shared by other developed countries and some rapidly developing third-world countries.There have been proposals for changing the structure of the Security Counciland the General Assembly. The Section is not presenting its views on this subject,but believes that a revision of the Charter is not necessary for that purpose asVOL. 29, NO. 2

Report on Improving the Effectiveness of the United Nations in Advancing the Rule of Law in the World

https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3099&amp;context=til

Report on Improving the Effectiveness of the United Nations in Advancing the Rule of Law in the World

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Southern Methodist University