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#18 – 1/27/25 – Unite for Democracy

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Eleanor Roosevelt was assertive as the Chair of the Human Rights Commission writing an International Bill of Rights. Not in an abrasive way, but as a prod. Much as a parent might give a child a loving push of encouragement, she pushed us all to act. This is particularly true of her feelings about democracy.

In her 1940 book, The Moral Basis of Democracy we can see how devout she was to democracy. She explained her intent in a short forward:

“… I am hoping in this little book to be able to give a clearer definition of the thinking of one citizen in a Democracy. By so doing it may be possible to stimulate the thoughts of many people so that they will force themselves to decide what Democracy means to them – whether they can believe in it as fervently as they can in their personal religion; whether it is worth a sacrifice to them, and what they consider that sacrifice must be.”

Following this quote, this blog asks the reader to take a moment and consider what democracy means to them. Do you believe fervently in democracy?

What is democracy? Democracy is conservative. Democracy is the people conserving the right to choose those who govern them. All power to govern is derived from the people governed, not some biological lineage like a king, or religious position. When the people give some of their power to a few elected people to govern them, they have every right to place restrictions on the representatives to whom they bestow a partial amount of their power, not all of it. In democracy, the people never give up all of their power; they always retain the power to place restrictions upon, or remove, those who govern.

This conservation of power by those governed is what Yuval Noah Harari calls a “self correcting mechanism.” It is forseeable that those given the power to govern will usurp it. For this reason, because humans can read and write, it is wise to draft a document that governs those who govern. This is the purpose of a Bill of Rights. It is a self correcting mechanism. That is, when a representative exceeds their power, coupled with a strong, independent judiciary, a self correction, court decisions, can be obtained by those governed. This fundamental, conservative, principle lies at the heart of Unite for Rights. An International Bill of Rights is an international self correcting mechanism that protects the right of all people on Earth to place limits on the power of those who govern, and enforce those limits in court.

It is noteworthy that this self correction is non-violent. Unite for Rights never calls for or condones violence. It is the rule of law, enforced in the courts of all countries, that brings about the self correction.

The question then, following the insight of Eleanor Roosevlt, is what are we willing to do for democracy? Will we create an international self correcting mechanism, an International Bill of Rights, or just let the brutes among us to do as they please? The answer, as Coldplay sings, is we are going “Up & Up” – humanity is leveling up – “We’re going to get it, get it together and flow; Going to get it, get it together and go; Up and up, and up”. We are not apes. Our human traits as primates make us suceptible to the seeming security of the dominant ape. We must resist this outdated false sense of security and efficiency – it may be more work, but it’s a better result when we pick our leaders through a democratic process, not have them foisted upon us based on hereditary background or religious officials. We are our own rulers.

Humans can conserve power rather than obsequiously accept the few who take all power for themselves to the detriment of the rest of us. How? It’s taking small steps with a pen or keyboard in hand such as becoming a “light for rights” and uniting with people, nonprofits, businesses and governments on the globe at the Unite website. The choice is a small step today to thwart the rise in athoritarianism, or fighting later in war which is the result of athoritarianism run amok – again. 

We can do better. As Malcolm Gladwell has written, “the world we could have is so much richer than the one we have settled for.”

Eleanor saw first hand the appeasement of Hitler in 1940. The refrain she resisted was that it was “up to the Germans” to decide if they wanted an athoritarian government. This appeasement made defeating Hitler more difficult later. It is never up to a country if they want to have slavery, it is impermisible anywhere on Earth: so too is athoritarianism, which is both mental and physical slavery

Unfortunately, appeasement to athoritarianism is happening once again. When Chinese President Xi had the Chinese Constitution changed in 2018 so that he could be President for life, President Trump congratulated him saying “he’s great” and joked that “America should try it.” After these remarks, President Trump’s press secretary said that regarding Xi being President for life, “he [Trump] was fine with what’s happening in China.”

This is not fine. Democracy is a human right. And this it not a claim directed only against China, but a claim made for all countries. It in enshrinded in the Universal Decalaration of Human Rights and is a centerpiece of the draft International Bill of Rights that is part of Unite for Rights. After World War II, a core part of “never again” was that never again shall an athoritarian leader govern a country. 

Eleanor and others understood that unbridled power leads to despotism. This is also a core concept of the U.S. Constitution, which provides for an independent judiciary. Eleanor warned: “Men who have the instincts for dictatorship are always a danger in any society. Free citizens must be constantly alert to preserve their liberties. In the United States, it is easy to discover a demagogue, but it sometimes requires courage to stand up immediately and say you don’t agree with certain methods and certain ideas. However, if we want to preserve our liberties, we had better show that courage – it is the only way I know of to remain a free people.” Americans, and people in other countries need to show such courage now.

The decline of democracy is not new and it is ongoing. According to a report issued by Freedom House Three-quarters of the people on Earth live in countries where freedom is declining.  2024 marked the 18th consecutive year of global democratic backsliding — “a long democratic recession,” in the organization’s words, that is “deepening.”

Let us all make a small, dedicated sacrafice, to fight now with words, and the rule of law, so that later we do not have to fight with guns, cyber-attacks or nuclear weapons. We’ve been down that road twice with two world wars – a third time and humanity is out. Act now. Participate in Unite for Rights to uphold democracy!

#28 – A HOLOGRAM FOR IMAGINATION AND COURAGE

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The biggest obstacle that Eleanor Roosevelt had to overcome as the Chair of the United Nations Human Rights Commission drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), was the naysayers who said you could never bring people in all countries to reach an agreement to live together based on fundamental rights for all. In response, Eleanor would say “we must do the thing we think we cannot do”, and then she would proceed.

As is often the case with the use of the word “never”, it proved to reflect the naysayer’s shortsightedness, not a true impossibility. The UDHR was passed unanimously in 1948, with eight abstentions, and no votes against.

December 10, 2023 is the 75th anniversary of the UDHR, and there are still naysayers who say that the rights in the UDHR will never become enforceable, but they overlook the Regional Courts: The European Court of Human Rights; the African Court of Human and Peoples Rights; the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, all of which are growing and today are handing down decisions that apply to more than half of Earth. This map dispels the naysayers and shows how these courts can be strengthened and expanded.2023 Jan 4 Map of Regional Courts

Eleanor said that to accomplish her plan for humanity she wished for people to exhibit two qualities: “imagination and courage.” These attributes can be found in the business community. Proto Hologram is a good example. Many of us Zoom these days; Proto is even better. It’s as if you are there in the room, not looking at a screen.

Why is this important to fulfilling Eleanor’s mission of enforceable rights for all? Because Proto Hologram can be used at events to spread the word about an International Bill of Rights with Regional Courts to enforce it. Speakers can attend from afar, and interact with attendees.

I saw this with Ellen DeGeneres when she used the same Hologram that I did. She appeared in the hologram with about 100 people in the room. Being clever, at first she moved a bit mechanically, and people in the room thought she was just another projected image. But then she started commenting on their jewelry and other things that she could only do if she was there with them – they were astounded, as was I.

Proto Hologram can be used to spark the imagination of people to feel that they can reach an agreement to live together, in whatever country where they might be. It’s interpersonal. It embodies all the subliminal communication of real life meetings. With outstanding speakers, actors and musicians, from various locations around the globe, appearing in life size form with the Proto hologram, they can inspire the courage for us to act together.

Robert Kennedy said: “Some men see things as they are, and question why? I dream things that never were, and say why not?” Because the founder of Proto, David Nussbaum, dared to think like this, we can experience something before us that was thought to be mere science fiction created by Isaac Asimov, who used a hologram with his character Harry Seldon in the “Foundation” series.

An interactive hologram is something that has been said to be “impossible”, but is well on its way. It’s a fine line between the impossible and the inevitable.

#27 – A MAP OF THE OUTCOME OF ELEANOR LIVES!

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Most of us have heard the saying “a picture is worth 1,000 words”. This map lives up to that saying. It reflects the outcome of the plan for humanity that Eleanor Lives! is working to achieve. Using Rousseau’s standard of “taking humans as they are, and making the laws as they might be,” there is no better plan for humanity than the one reflected in this map.

CLICK BELOW TO SEE AN ENLARGEMENT OF THIS MAP!

2023 Jan 4 Map of Regional Courts

If you have a better plan, please share it, and collect your €5,000. If not, I ask you to engage with and share this one.

In 25 years of studying and working to make the rights in the UDHR “juridical” (As I promised a former Dean of the Berkeley Law School, Frank Newman, I would do), I’ve never heard anyone articulate a better plan for enforceable human rights than this map coupled with the draft International Bill of Rights on the website.

It was understood when the UDHR was created that there would need to be Regional Courts to enforce rights, and the European Court of Human Rights is a prime example. As John Humphrey, the Canadian professor who did much of the research for the UDHR has written, “if the international community ever becomes really serious about human rights, the European example will be applied on the universal scale.” This map shows how that can happen.

Humanity must exercise its free will over the authoritarians who continue to dominate nation states, and much of this world’s valuable resources, including human resources.

We either make stronger rules for those who govern, and create independent courts that have the power to exercise judgments against those them, or we all live with continued despotism and environmental ruin. Blame and shame will never be enough. As Einstein said “doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity” – just look at the Ukraine – Putin declared he would not follow the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. The answer is not to say “courts don’t work,” but to make them stronger.

Also, the repetitive creation of new human rights instruments that do no more than require more reports should stop. It’s time to demand enforceable documents and object if something less than that is created.

At some point in humanity’s evolution, leaders of all countries must be responsible to Courts with independent Judges to enforce the rights that humans have reserved for themselves through Bills of Rights. A Bill of Rights gives limited power to those who govern. This is a conservative fundamental principle.

In 2023, the 75th anniversary of the UDHR, all human rights organizations, philanthropies, academics, and civil rights groups in all countries should bind together to use their collective clout and become “lights for rights” on the Eleanor Lives! spinning globe to show their support for the UDHR on its 75th anniversary. The framers of the UDHR always an intended linkage between the UDHR and the Courts depicted in this map. 2023 is the time to link the two.

Thanks for helping to make this happen.

#26 – Reaffirmation of the Mission of Eleanor Lives!

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What follows is a reaffirmation, not a revision, of the mission of Eleanor Lives! The mission of Eleanor Lives! is crystal clear and has not changed since the creation of the nonprofit organization on International Women’s Day, March 8, 2020.

The mission of Eleanor Lives! is to revive Eleanor Roosevelt’s legacy and plan for humanity. After 50 million people were killed in WWII, many of them in gas chambers and other horrific ways, there was agreement that steps had to be taken to prevent athoritarian tyrants from violating the rights of citizens and waging war on their neighbors.

The creation of the United Nations was the first step in this direction, but it was understood that it was not enough to make rules to stop countries from waging war on one another, there needed to be a set of rights for people in all countries and courts to enforce them. To this end, at the War Memorial building in San Francisco, President Truman told the closing ceremony for the U.N. Charter in San Francisco  “The first thing we will do is prepare an International Bill of Rights.”

President Truman then turned to Eleanor Roosevelt, and appointed her a delegate to the United Nations, where she became Chair of the newly created Human Rights Commission. The Commision’s goal was to implement this plan for an International Bill of Rights. and Eleanor, along with an international body, set out to draft an International Bill of Rights.

As they worked, the Cold War stifled the vision of an enforceable International Bill of Rights, a true rights based approach that could prevent athoritarian governments from coming to power in any county, and provide for rights such as education and health care in all countries to provide for well-being for all.

Wisely, after a beautiful International Bill of Rights was written, rather than let the lack of enforcement kill the effort, Eleanor and others moved to an unenforceable declaration, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Even though they understood that the UDHR was unenforceable, they specifically inserted Article 28 into that Declaration stating the intent that future documents would be created that would make the rights in the UDHR enforceable in the courts of all countries.

This plan has partially worked. Following the UDHR, the European Convention on Human Rights was created in 1953, and with it a European Court of Human Rights emerged with judges from 47 countries enforcing the same Bill of Rights in all countries. If countries do not follow the decisions of the European Court, and make those decisions part of their domestic law, they can be fined, and if that does not work, they can be forced out of the Council of Europe, thereby losing valuable European trade privileges with 47 countries.

For many decades, the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights were almost uniformly followed by all 47 countries. Recently, with the invasion of Ukraine, and the statement of the Russian Government that its courts are not bound by the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, the Court has been damaged. Nonetheless, it still remains as the best protection for human rights today, not the United Nations where almost all of the human rights machinery remains primarily reports and opinions that are not enforceable in courts of law.

Rene Cassin, who worked with Eleanor on the UDHR and was one of the first judges on the European Court, won the Nobel Peace prize. With respect to the European Court he told the Nobel Committee two simple words “It works.”

And Regional Courts do work. The Inter-American Court on Human Rights has been slowly advancing, as has the African Court on Human and People’s Rights, but these courts are not yet sufficiently developed to constitute an International Bill of Rights. Truman’s call for an International Bill of Rights has yet to be answered.

Why is this? It’s not because humans are just athoritarian by nature, like apes, which rely on hiearchy. Humans can read and write; that makes us unique among all species on Earth. Through reading and writing we can tell stories; the stories we tell create the lives that we lead.

The story of an International Bill of Rights has gone fallow. It not just because of the athoritarian elements within the United Nations, of which there are many and theirs numbers are growing, its also because the human rights community has become complacent and myopic, thinking that blaming and shaming is enough and not pushing for law. Almost all of the work at the UN on human rights consists of declaratons and reports. The Universal Periodic Review is a good example of discussion, but not law.

Einstein said “The problems of the world do not exist because of the evil people, but because of the good people who do nothing about them.”  This profound insight is precisely where humanity finds itself today. There is a poem that fits with this insight “An Ambulance or a Fence” by Joseph Malins. In that poem there is a cliff from which many are falling to their injury and death below. There is a debate in the town about whether to build a fence up top, or ambulances to rush to people at the bottom. The ambulances prevail.

Such is the bulk of the international human rights system today, and, as in the poem, when a call is made to build a fence, an International Bill of Rights, the ambulance manufacturers and drivers, to the glee of the athoritarians and monetary interests who are casting people off the cliff, and destroying Earth’s biosphere while they are at it, call out in near unison, “we’ll build ambulances forever, how dare you distract us with a fence?”

Of course it’s a false dilemma. Ambulances and a fence are not mutually exclusive. Ambulances will always be needed, and those who build them and drive them are to be applauded. The problem is that the ambulance proponents, with the aid of athoritarian governments who do not want law to curtail their behaviors, do not actively support building a fence in addition to their work.

The celebration of the 75th anniversary of the United Nations is a good example. Hundreds of NGOs gathered to proclaim human rights as if saying rights repeatedly somehow makes them become law. (Jus cogens rarely works). Almost none of them even mentioned the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and none of them called for the expansion of Regional Courts and a renewed commitment toward an International Bill of Rights. 

The 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is rapidly approaching, December 10, 2023. This oversight of the UDHR must not happen again. Eleanor Lives! has booked the War Memorial building, the birthplace of the UDHR, for a two day event. The goal of the event is the same as the mission of Eleanor Lives, to revive a plan for humanity, embodied in the UDHR, but still in need of implementation. It’s time to build a fence.

To this end, there are three specific things you can do to help Eleanor Lives! celebrate and reaffirm the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on its 75th anniversary:

One, join the “Lights for Rights” campaign by signing your name and country on the website to show support for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on its 75th anniversary. This will create a light on the spinning globe wherever you are.he film shows how we can look through the eyes of astronauts for the inspiration to unite on Earth.

Two, help raise funds for the event by contributing 10 dollars to the Eleanor Lives “$10 from 10 million campaign.” (The first 300 hundred people, organizations or businesses to do so receive a free ticket to the event, which includes heavy hors d’oeuvres and great entertainment in a beautiful 1,000 seat theater where the closing ceremony for the United Nations was held.

Three, make a comment on the website as to what rights you think should be included in the draft International Bill of Rights

The goal of Eleanor Lives! for the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 2023, is to have 100,000 lights of people, nonprofits and businesses on globes around the world that all show the lights being added in real time.

And if you are wondering whether we can succeed, recall Eleanor’s words “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” She believed in the beauty of her dreams and we can make them our future by building ambulances and a fence. 

 

25 – $5,000 US Dollar Award for a Better Plan than the Eleanor Lives Booklet

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In the movie “King Richard”, the father of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams, Richard, has them put up a hand painted banner on a chain link fence around a delapidated tennis court in Compton, California. The sign reads: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”. That’s where humanity is now: by failing to plan, we are failing.

The invasion and war against Ukraine may leave humanity with athoritarianism expanded. China, itself athoritarian, is aiding Russia by increasing its purchases of oil so that Putin has funding for his war. Between the war and social forces, the climate crisis is not being addressed, with emissions actually increasing, and there is an ongoing mass extinction on Earth due to the actions of human beings.

In 1984 there was a hamburger fast food advertisment with a simple question: “Where’s the beef?” The tiny hamburger patty that was shown was inadequate.

Today the question is “Where’s the plan”. The post WWII implementation of enforceable human rights is inadequate. It’s been worthwhile, but is a hodgepodge that for the most part is unenforceable in courts.

There are over 2 million nonprofits internationally – and over 260,000 foundations – it’s time to stop traveling in parallel and dancing on the periphery claiming that human rights are enforceable when they are not. We need a plan to collect our clout, make them truly enforceable, and achieve most of our missions.

We do not need to construct a plan from scratch. If we take Eleanor’s work after WWI (the first entry in her FBI file was collected when she was working for a World Court after WWI) and combine it with her work, with others, on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights after WWII, we have a plan for humaity. That plan rests upon a set of fundamental rights for all people in all countries, enforceable in the courts of all countries.

That plan is embodied in the booklet you can flip through just to the right of the sentence you are now reading. It’s right there; dare to read it. Using the standard that Rousseau set forth in Social Contract (1762) “To take people as they are, and write the laws as they might be”, this little booklet contains the best plan for humanity ever written. 

Do you think you have a better one? “Where’s the plan?” Present it, whether you wrote it on a napkin, or found it in any written piece you may have read throughout the history of humanity. We’ll pay you for it: Eleanor Lives! will give 5,ooo dollars for any plan for humanity that is better than the one in the booklet, which includes the draft International Bill of Rights in the booklet.

Every breakthrough, be it in law or physics, needs to be tested. So far, over the past 10 years that a $1,000 award has been offered, no one has presented a better, secular, plan – so we are raising the award to $5,000 – and we may raise it higher. The standard is what is optimum? – not what will the North Koreans or the Russians accept at this moment. What can we all do to organize as an international community? – just prior to our heading out into the stars, our destiny.

If you do not have a better plan that you have written yourself, or found written by someone else, then please become a “light for rights” on the globe on the website and support Eleanor’s plan. It takes less than a minute and will be one of the most powerful things you do in your life. Some things, like a plan for humanity, can never be done by one person, or a few people – it takes collective action. By joining with others, you help create something you could never do yourself, no matter how wealthy, or powerful, you may be.

If you do have a better plan, thank you, we will pay you $5,000 and join you, as Eleanor would, – humanity needs a plan to free us from the failure in which we find ourselves.

 

24 – War – Again! – No Surprise

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War again! Having just returned to the U.S. from Poland and talking with people from Bucha where Putin used cluster bombs over civilian residences and then bombed the hospitals after they went to remove the shrapnel stuck in them, the most common comment I hear is “I can’t believe what Putin is doing.” Believe it. It’s no surprise; it’s a repeat.

After WWI, Eleanor Roosevelt argued strenuously that we needed to have a World Court based on fundamental rights to prevent despots from seizing control and waging war. Unfortunately, political forces, including in the US, prevented this from happening. Then came Hitler.

After 60 million killed, Eleanor again tried to empower humans to restrain despots through the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Again, it hasn’t worked. It’s not her fault, it’s our fault. As much as human rights organizations trumpet the UDHR, it has not been sufficiently implemented, it lacks the power of law. Incremental efforts have been insufficient – hence we have another war.

This is not to say that incrementalism has been worthless. It has cultivated the ground to where people internationally are unwilling to live under despots, as the Ukrainians are courageously showing the rest of us. We must arm them and support them. Putin’s outdated authoritarian view of the world must be thwarted, even if it means using heavy military to stop him.

But we must also plan for the peace. Eleanor and others did this long before the end of WWII. They called for and worked for an “International Bill of Rights,” enforceable in the courts of all countries. It’s time to look back to see our way forward. There will always be brutes and despots. The only way, even in democracies, to be free of authoritarian rule is if there are independent courts and judges, with the power to enforce a Bill of Rights.

So if you don’t like the war, stop saying you don’t believe it and act. That’s what Eleanor did. Continue her movement by becoming a “light for rights” on this website showing the world that you support the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Eleanor’s greatest accomplish, with others, on its 75th anniversary.

Help fulfill Eleanor's dream!

Fight war; fight despotism; take 30 seconds to join with others. Be a light for rights!

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