Joseph Raz of Oxford University has published on SSRN a short essay entitled "Human Rights Without Foundations" that is getting a lot of play, with over 150 downloads in less than a month. He offers a theory of human rights that rejects the notion that human rights must encompass universal norms and instead argues for a political approach to...
In a column that only a NYT columnist could write, Nicholas Kristof gives President Bush a 10-point plan to solve the Darfur Crisis. After noting that Condi Rice talked President Bush out of his initial instinct to send in the Marines, Kristof offers mostly sensible advice, starting with U.S. pressure to come up with a negotiated peace settlement in...
A federal district court in Washington D.C. has rendered an important decision imposing limits on the scope of terrorism claims. In Oveissi v. Iran, the court addressed an action "aris[ing] from the death of Gholam Ali Oveissi, chief of the Iranian armed forces under the Shah's pre-revolutionary government, who was gunned down on a Paris street in February 1984....
Here is an interesting profile in the Los Angeles Times of Ahmad Harun, one of the top two Sudan government officials indicted by the ICC for committing war crimes in Darfur. In a possibly sick twist, Harun is currently serving as Sudan's minister for humanitarian affairs. In any event, he seems free for now. I wonder if...
I expect very little from the media in terms of legal accuracy, particularly concerning the ICC. But this article — reproduced in one form or another in dozens of newspapers — is still a doozy:The International Criminal Court may try former Namibian president Sam Nujoma and three others in connection with the disappearance of hundreds of people. A local newspaper...
"What's Canada for?" This may seem like an odd question, but one to which Michael Byers, a lawprof at the University of British Columbia and director of the Liu Center for Global Policy there, has a clear answer. Canada should exist in order to pursue a progressive, international-law abiding foreign policy. So says his new book entitled:...
"Justice delayed," William Gladstone once said," is justice denied." True enough, but there is a competing adage: "better late than never." The latter clearly applies to the tragic story of an Australian aborigine who was awarded more than $400,000 last week for being stolen from his family as a child:"The best thing is knowing they never forgot me,...
Another little news item that I forgot to post about this week: A court of appeals in Paris on Wednesday released two Rwandans from custody despite acknowledging both were the subject of arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Not surprisingly, the Rwandan government (already barely on speaking terms with the French government) is not...
Professor Flaherty’s recent post is a great one in getting at the essence of my view and our disagreement, and a fitting way to wrap up the discussion. I do believe in a coherent Constitution. Not a perfect Constitution, for the text surely has redundancies, gaps and contradictions on particular matters, as well as substantive flaws. But I think...
Professor Kent’s additional comments helpfully clarify his textual argument on the power to respond to attacks. I now see (I think) that he is relying on a negative implication: the President must not have this power because it would vitiate important powers of Congress. I do think this is a more promising approach than trying to jam the...
Russia has been busily working to take possession of half of the Arctic Sea (or at least the seabeds under half of the Arctic Sea). In a dramatic mission covered heavily by Russian television, the Russian government has planted a titanium Russian flag on the seabed underneath the Arctic Sea. (I'm still looking for photos of the flag on...
Thanks again for the excellent comments. Here I’ll take up those offered by Professors Spiro and Ku. I agree with Professor Spiro that historical textualism can only go so far in answering modern questions (assuming one wanted to use it that way), and that some contemporary perspective is inevitable. But I think it goes a...
