Commissioners’ Joint Statement Regarding the National Truth Commission

This Commission was at the Christ Lutheran Church in St. Paul, Minnesota on Monday, September 1, 2008.

During their consideration of the testimonies heard and received at the hearings, the Commissioners focused on three questions:
1) do the testimonies and documents received during this hearing describe human rights violations?
2) if so, could these human rights violations have been prevented? and

3) if so, who is responsible?

The Commission’s answers to these questions is as follows:

1. Yes, the testimonies and documents received do describe violations of human rights. The basic nature of human rights as recognized worldwide in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is that they are inherent. People are born with them. They do not arise only when a government recognizes them or confers them to people. Therefore, for example, the rights to housing, medical care, employment, freedom from racial discrimination, and an adequate standard of living in all respects (including heat) are human rights of all people everywhere. The testimonies and documents received spoke to inadequacies in the provision and availability of these basic human rights.

2. Yes, these human rights violations could have been prevented. As the most affluent nation on earth, the United States has had unequalled opportunity and financial capacity to honor these human rights. If the country’s leaders at all levels had committed themselves to shape the country’s agenda and societal expectations to honor these rights from the time they were first articulated nearly 40 years ago when the United States signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, these human rights would be honored today rather than being largely ignored and violated for so many people in this country as they are today.

3. Responsibility for these violations: responsibility for the failure to develop an economy that promotes and achieves the human rights to housing, healthcare, education, employment, etcetera. lies in all who have had an opportunity to bring about the changes necessary to achieve that goal. Some of us have had greater opportunity to pursue these goals and therefore bear greater responsibility. The greatest responsibility, therefore, lies with the framers and maintainers of the structure, goals, and operation of the current economy: 1) governments at all levels, since it is the government at all levels that has the greatest capacity to promote those human rights through its administrative agencies and its economic and social policies; 2) both major political parties; and 3) corporate, professional, religious, and civic leadership.

At the same time, to the extent that we as individuals and grass roots organizations have the energy, capacity, and vision to promote these human rights, we also bear responsibility to promote observance of these human rights by, for example, holding those with even greater capacity and responsibility accountable to their responsibility under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the universally recognized Bill of Human Rights*, and the ratified human rights treaties** to promote and achieve those rights.
We urge careful consideration of these findings and observation by all concerned.

Respectfully submitted as the Joint Statement of the Commissioners,

Ajamu Baraka, Executive Director, US Human Rights Network - Atlanta, Gerrgia
Bill Means, American Indian Movement and International Indian Treaty Council - Minneapolis, Minnesota
Sister Dorothy Pagosa, Sisters of St. Joseph - Chicago, Illinios
Professor Edward Oyugi, Social Development Network and African Social Forum - Kenya
Rosa Clemente, Green Party Vice Presidential Candidate
Michael Kane, Habitat International Coalition and National Alliance of HUD Tenants - Boston, Massachusetts
Lennart Kjorling, Journalist - Sweden
Rev. Bruce Wright, Refuge of St. Petersburg, Florida
Shamako Noble, Hip Hop Congress - California
Pastor Gary Dreier - Christ Lutheran Church on Capitol Hill - St. Paul, Minnesota
Imam Sheikh Saad Musse Roble - Minneapolis, Minnesota
Michael Crenshaw - Hip Hop Congress - Portland, Oregon
Rev. Nancy Anderson - Minneapolis, Minnesota
Mary Brandl - Union Steward of AFSCME Clerical Workers Local #3800 - Minneapolis, Minnesota
Peter W. Brown - National Lawyers Guild - Minneapolis, Minnesota


* The Bill of Human Rights consists of the two treaties: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR, ratified by the US Congress in 1992) and the International Convention on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR, signed by President Carter in 1976 but not yet ratified by the US Congress.)
** The human rights treaties that the United States has ratified are: 1) International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR, ratified by the US Congress in 1992); 2) Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT, ratified by the US Congress in 1994); and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD ratified by US Congress 1994).

Labels: 2008 National Truth Commission, M4OL Coverage, March for Our Lives