A British View of the Covenant

Abstract

The Human Rights Covenant is an eloquent witness to the vitality of the Law of Nature. It speaks of human rights in international terms and is a new affirmation of the old union of ius gentium and ius naturale; Nam ad ius gentium pertinent, says Thomas Aquinas,' ea quae derivantur ex lege naturae, sicut conclusiones ex principiis ... sine quibus homines ad invicem convivere non possunt. Already Grotius2 had abandoned the position that natural law is coordinate with divine law, since he believed it could be found by the exercise of right reason, that is, human reason; while over against natural law stands the law imposed by the legislative will, either human or divine; and we find Locke declaring not only that we are born free but also that we are born rational.3 It is but a short step to the belief that any act contrary to the natural law is null and void; that neither contract4 nor legislation5 can impair rights and duties grounded in the natural law as determined by human reason; and that natural or innate rights are separate from and superior to civil or acquired rights. It is these beliefs which have given the Law of Nature its dynamism, for they generate protest and struggle against the dictates of princes and governments. We shall find that much of this thinking underlies the Human Rights Covenant. The common law of England has conceived human rights differently. Though it too has felt the purifying influence of the Law of Nature,6 it has regarded the individual not as the grantee of a number of precisely defined rights but rather as a person whose rights and freedoms are presumed to be unlimited-and therefore undefined-until and to the extent that his contacts with his fellowmen make their