SOURCE The Avalon Project at Yale Law School. Available from http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htm

INTRODUCTION Adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 10, 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights his described in its preamble as constituting a "common standard of achievement," Those who prepared it relied upon a study of national constitutions in an attempt to distill a common denominator of human rights that would be of universal application. The U.S. representative to the UN Commission on Human Rights, Eleanor Roosevelt, presided over the process, but she was assisted by personalities from Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Arab world. The Declaration's significance has been reaffirmed subsequently in various treaties and declarations, and it retains its universal significance. Some experts...