{"id":1788,"date":"2008-06-01T09:01:35","date_gmt":"2008-06-01T13:01:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/site\/?p=1788"},"modified":"2010-11-19T08:45:30","modified_gmt":"2010-11-19T12:45:30","slug":"issue_49-2_connor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/2008\/06\/issue_49-2_connor\/","title":{"rendered":"The United States\u2019 Second and Third Periodic Report to the United Nations Human Rights Committee"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Abstract<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>As  a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,  the United States is required to submit periodic reports to the treaty\u2019s  supervisory body, the United Nations Human Rights Committee. The United  States recently submitted its joint Second and Third Periodic Report.  The Report\u2014the United States\u2019 first in eleven years\u2014came in the midst of  intense scrutiny over the government\u2019s human rights record. Even in the  absence of these controversies, the U.S. Report would have marked an  important development in international human rights law, given the  special place the United States holds as a world superpower and key  human rights advocate. Further adding to the significance of the U.S.  Report is the high profile of the ICCPR and the Human Rights Committee.  All sides\u2014the Committee, the U.S. government, and the human rights  community\u2014took advantage of the opportunity to voice their positions on  the ICCPR\u2019s provisions and U.S. human rights practices. For these  reasons, the U.S. Report represents an important development in  international human rights law, and one that relates to a broad array of  topics, including treaty interpretation and enforcement, the status and  content of human rights law, and domestic implementation of  international law.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>This Note provides a descriptive account of  the U.S. Report that is situated in the wider body of scholarship on the  ICCPR and international human rights treaty obligations; in addition,  it offers a normative assessment of the Committee\u2019s reaction to the U.S.  Report. I argue that the Committee in several instances pressed the  United States too far, and in doing so risked sacrificing its  credibility and alienating states parties. I point to the debate over  the territorial application of the ICCPR and the United States\u2019  reservation to the treaty\u2019s prohibition on the juvenile death penalty to  illustrate my argument.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the United States is required to submit periodic reports to the treaty\u2019s supervisory body, the United Nations Human Rights Committee. The United States recently submitted its joint Second and Third Periodic Report. The Report\u2014the United States\u2019 first in eleven years\u2014came in the midst of intense scrutiny over the government\u2019s human rights record.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-print-archives"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZu3S-sQ","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}