The Ad Hoc Committee on the Human Rights and Genocide Treaties –a coalition of 52 national religious, labor, civic and ethnic groups–today called upon the Senate “to demonstrate its support for international human rights by voting its approval of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the crime of Genocide.” The Genocide Convention, which was adopted by the United Nations in 1948 and signed by the United States but never formally ratified, will come before the Senate for a test vote tomorrow.
According to Betty Kaye Taylor, executive secretary of the Ad Hoc Committee, 64 Senators are pledged to vote for ratification despite a massive campaign to defeat the treaty organized by ultra conservative groups. Mrs. Taylor said “We are hopeful that the Senate will repudiate efforts of the Liberty Lobby and the John Birch Society and will instead reaffirm our nation’s long-standing commitment to international human rights based on world law.
Constitutional objections raised by opponents of the treaty, she added, “have been fully rebutted by the Department of Justice, the State Department and all relevant sections of the American Bar Association. Former Supreme Court Justice Arthur J. Goldberg, who also served as U.S. Ambassador to the UN, is chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee.
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