Supreme Court or World Court?

The UN Wants Population Control in Ethiopia, CEDAW Passed, Appointed 3 Pro-Abortion Judges to the International Court

International Criminal Court, Unsafe in ANY form

Annan in historic meeting with Supreme Court &Congress/is believed to be unprecedented

"If instant world government, Charter review, and a greatly strengthened International Court do not provide the answers, what hope for progress is there? The answer will not satisfy those who seek simple solutions to complex problems, but it comes down essentially to this: The hope for the foreseeable lies, not in building up a few ambitious central institutions of universal membership and general jurisdiction as was envisaged at the end of the last war, but rather in the much more decentralized, disorderly and pragmatic process of inventing or adapting institutions of limited jurisdiction and selected membership to deal with specific problems on a case-by-case basis ... In short, the 'house of world order' will have to be built from the bottom up rather than f rom the top down. It will look like a great 'booming, buzzing confusion,' to use William James' famous description of reality, but an end run around national sovereignty, eroding it piece by piece, will accomplish much more than the old-fashioned frontal assault."
Richard N. Gardner, in Foreign Affairs (April 1974)
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Under the U.N. Gavel
By Sen. Larry E. Craig, R-ID

August 22, 2001

At its founding, the mission of the United Nations, as stated in its charter, was "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war." It made no claim to supersede the sovereignty of its member states. Article 2 says that the United Nations "is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members," and it may not "intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state."

Since then, the United Nations has turned the principle of national sovereignty on its head. Through a host of conventions, treaties and conferences, it has intruded into regulation of resources and the economy (for example, treaties on "biological diversity," marine resources and climate change) and family life (hyping phoney liberalism while masculinity is scorned and western manhood is amputated - causing untold grief to the family unit) (conventions on parent-child relations and women in society). It has demanded that countries institute racial quotas and laws against hate crimes and speech (while the U.N. itself can jail someone for 30 years without trial). Recently the United Nations tried to undermine Americans' constitutional right to keep and bear arms (with proposed restrictions on the international sale of small arms).

Fortunately, many of these have been dead on arrival in the U.S. Senate, successive presidents have refused to endorse others, and in any case the United Nations had little power of enforcement. But in 1998, one mechanism of global government (there it is in the Washington Post folks) came to life with the so-called "Rome Statute" establishing a permanent International Criminal Court (and abolishing the Magna Carta in Britain). Once this treaty is ratified by 60 countries, the United Nations will wield judicial power over every individual human being -- even over citizens of countries that haven't joined the court.

While the court's stated mission is dealing with war crimes and crimes against humanity (what about their own crimes against humanity when they committed widespread genocide in the Balkans and East Timor? Dare I say they are hypocrites?) -- which, because there is no appeal from its decisions, only the court will have the right to define -- its mandate could be broadened later. Based on existing U.N. tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, which are models for the International Criminal Court, defendants will have none of the due process rights afforded by the U.S. Constitution, such as trial by jury, confrontation of witnesses or a speedy and public trial (that's a communist court system!).

President Clinton signed the Rome treaty last year, citing U.S. support for existing U.N. war crimes tribunals. Many suppose the court will target only a Slobodan Milosevic or the perpetrators of massacres in Rwanda, or dictators like Iraq's Saddam Hussein. But who knows? To some people, Augusto Pinochet is the man who saved Chile from communism; to others he is a murderer. Who should judge him -- the United Nations or the Chilean people?

In dozens of countries, governments use brutal force against insurgents. Should the United Nations decide whether leaders in Turkey or India should be put in the defendants' dock, and then commit the United States to bring them there? How about Russia's Vladimir Putin, for Chechnya? Or Israel's Ariel Sharon? Can we trust the United Nations with that decision (the more evil these premieres are - the more the U.N. loves them)?

The court's critics rightly cite the danger to U.S. military personnel deployed abroad. Since even one death can be a war crime, a U.S. soldier could be indicted just for doing his duty. But the International Criminal Court also would apply to acts "committed" by any American here at home. The European Union and U.S. domestic opponents consider the death penalty "discriminatory" and "inhumane." Could an American governor face indictment by the court for "crimes against humanity" for signing a death warrant?

Milosevic was delivered to a U.N. court (largely at U.S. insistence) for offences occurring entirely within his own country. Some say the Milosevic precedent doesn't threaten Americans, because the U.S. Constitution protects them. But for Milosevic, we demanded that the Yugoslav Constitution be trashed and the United Nations' authority prevail. Why should the International Criminal Court treat our Constitution any better (they're already destroying the 2nd amendment with their gun grab and the 1st with their phoney 'hate crime' nonsense)?

Instead of trying to "fix" the Rome treaty, the United States must recognize that it is a fundamental threat to American sovereignty. The State Department's participation in the court's preparatory commission is counterproductive. We need to make it clear that we consider the court an illegitimate body, that the United States will never join it and that we will never accept its "jurisdiction" over any U.S. citizen or help to impose it on other countries.

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