René Cassin

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This article is about the person René Cassin. For the human-rights group named after him, see CCJO René Cassin.

René Cassin
law professor and judge
Known forAdvocacy for Human Rights
Notable workUniversal Declaration of Human Rights
AwardsNobel Peace Prize (1968)

René Samuel Cassin (5 October 1887 – 20 February 1976) was a French jurist known for co-authoring the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.

Born in

First World War during which he was seriously wounded. He was of Portuguese-Jewish descent.[1]

On 24 June 1940, during the

Free French
.

Between 1944 and 1959, Cassin was a member of the

Council of State
.

Seconded to the

UN General Assembly's Human Rights Prizes
.

Early life

Memorial to Cassin in Forbach, France

Cassin was born in

Jewish family.[2] He grew up in Nice, where he attended the Lycée Masséna [fr], and graduated with a bachelor's degree at 17. At the University of Provence[citation needed] he studied political economics, constitutional history, and Roman law and was awarded distinctions in law, a university degree with distinction and the first prize in the competitive examinations in the faculty of law. He was an invited speaker at international peace conferences. In 1914 in Paris, he was awarded his doctorate in juridical science, economics and politics.[3]

First World War

Cassin served in the

Battle of the Meuse. In one operation, he led the attack on enemy positions and was gravely injured in the arm, side and stomach by machine gunfire. A medic saved his life, but he received surgical treatment only ten days later at Antibes. He was awarded the Croix de Guerre for his actions but was too seriously injured to return to active duty,[3] and he was mustered out as a war invalid.[4]

Interwar period

He helped to found the Union fédérale, a leftist pacifist organization for veterans.

Cassin also headed many

non-governmental organizations
(NGO) and founded the French Federation of Disabled War Veterans in 1918 and served until 1940 as its president and then as its honorary president.

In 1920, Cassin was appointed professor of law at Lille and in 1929 at Paris, where he continued to teach until 1960. In addition, he taught at the Academy of International Law of The Hague, and at the

Institut Universitaire des Hautes Etudes Internationales of Geneva, among other places.[5]

As a French delegate to the League of Nations from 1924 to 1938, Cassin pressed for progress on disarmament and for developing institutions to aid the resolution of international conflicts.[citation needed]

Second World War

René Cassin with the French National Committee in London.

Refusing the armistice, Cassin embarked on a British ship, the SS Ettrick, in Saint-Jean-de-Luz on 24 June 1940, and joined General Charles de Gaulle in London to help him continue the war against Germany. Cassin was, therefore, one of the first to join de Gaulle.[6][page needed] De Gaulle needed legal help to draft the statutes of Free France and so Cassin's arrival in London was very welcome.[7]

René Cassin did not speak English but already knew leading academics and political figures like British Foreign Minister Anthony Eden.[8]

In April 1941, Cassin made a radio broadcast from London by addressing himself especially to

French Jews from a secular viewpoint and reminding them of the full and equal protection that France had always offered to Jews since the French Revolution. He exhorted them to help pay back that debt by joining the forces of Free France. In May, Vichy France stripped Cassin of his French citizenship and in 1942 sentenced him to death in absentia.[9]

Later life and career

After the war, Cassin was assigned to the United Nations to help draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Working from a list of rights elaborated by the Canadian scholar and professor of law John Humphrey, Cassin produced a revised draft and expanded the text.[10]

He served on the UN Human Rights Commission and the Hague Court of Arbitration.

He was also a member (1959–1965) and president (1965–1968) of the European Court of Human Rights. The court building is now on Allée René Cassin, in Strasbourg.[citation needed]

In 1945, General de Gaulle suggested that Cassin, having done so much for the French people, also do something to help the Jewish people. Cassin became the president of the French-Jewish

Sephardi Jews living in the Ottoman Empire according to a modern French curriculum. As president of the AIU, Cassin worked with the American Jewish Committee and the Anglo-Jewish Association to found the Consultative Council of Jewish Organisations, a network dedicated to building support for Cassin's platform of human rights from a Jewish perspective[clarification needed] while the UN human rights system was in its early stages of development.[11][page needed
]

In 1947, Cassin created the French Institute of Administrative Sciences (IFSA). He was the first president of the association, which organized many conferences to help to develop the French doctrine in administrative law.[clarification needed]

On 10 November 1950, he was photographed at a UN radio, alongside Karim Azkoul, Georges Day and Herald CL Roy, participating in a roundtable discussion for the use of French-speaking countries. That is perhaps all the more interesting because Azkoul and Cassin differed so strongly in their perspectives concerning the politics of Zionism.[12]

Cassin died in

Pantheon
in Paris.

Legacy

In 2001, the

universal human rights
from a Jewish perspective.

The René Cassin Medal is awarded by the CCJO to those who have made an outstanding global contribution to human rights. As the head of the Alliance Israélite in France, Cassin had pursued civil rights for the Jews and was an active Zionist.[citation needed]

A high school in Jerusalem is named after him.[citation needed] [13]

In 2003, the

International Human Rights Day.[14]

The law campus of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University is named after him. [15]

See also

References

  1. ISBN 9780773576667
    .
  2. ^ "René Cassin » Making the Jewish Case for Human Rights – Monsieur René Cassin". 26 February 2019.
  3. ^ a b Union Fédérale 2016.
  4. ^ Haberman 1972, p. 386.
  5. ^ "Cassin, René Samuel". www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  6. ^ Crémieux-Brilhac 1996.
  7. ^ Glendon 2001, p. 62.
  8. ^ René Cassin, l'inconnu du Panthéon
  9. ^ Glendon 2001, p. 63.
  10. ^ Glendon 2001, p. 62–65.
  11. ^ Winter 2012.
  12. ^ Photo/MB, UN (10 November 1950). "Round Table Discussion over U.N. Radio". www.unmultimedia.org. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
  13. ^ "Rene Cassin Darca, Jerusalem".
  14. ^ "Premio René Cassin". 2 October 2014.
  15. ^ "Le campus Port-Royal | Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne". Pantheon Sorbonne University. Retrieved 14 March 2024.

Works cited

External links

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