Remarks at the American Bar Association of International Law Fall Meeting
Wednesday, 12th October, 2011
Good morning everybody and thank you for your warm welcome to The American Bar Association of International Law Fall Meeting. Let me, in turn, welcome all of you to Dublin - and in particular those whom I know have travelled enormous distances to be here. You pay Ireland a huge compliment by being here and I offer you the traditional Irish welcome in our Gaelic language, céad míle fáilte, one hundred thousand welcomes.
All of you are here because you care about the law; you work to uphold the law and to ensure justice is available to all. You know the truth of Martin Luther King’s assertion that ‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere’ and you strive to live by that precept. I congratulate your association on your long-standing collective commitment to the stated goal of defending liberty and delivering justice.
We are living in an age where we are increasingly conscious that justice is not a passive concept; it is not something that simply happens organically; it has to be pursued, fought for, defended and upheld. In an open society and a globalised world, many of us have become shockingly aware of the many great injustices that have been perpetrated and continue to be perpetrated, on innocent citizens around the world. We are incensed, distressed and angry when we hear of prejudice, inequality, abuse or discrimination being inflicted on blameless and vulnerable people.
And we are even more outraged and upset when we realise how often these vulnerable people do not even realise that their rights are being violated, are perhaps not even aware that they have any rights and that they are, or should be, equal in law to those who perpetrate such wrong. There are many great injustices we can inflict on our fellow man, but one of the greatest injustices of all, one of the cruellest things we can do to anyone, is to keep them in ignorance of their human rights, of the fact that they have a voice in society, a right to respect, to dignity, to equality and to recognition; that they matter and that they are valuable members of society.
Here in Ireland as in so many other countries in recent years, a searching and none too flattering spotlight has been shone on the way we have treated vulnerable people in the not too distant past. We have learnt how so many of our nation’s weaker and more helpless citizens have been so badly let down by institutions, systems and a society that were meant to be helping them, protecting them and having their best interests at heart. We have realised, as more and more distressing accounts are revealed and more alarming reports are published, the terrible legacy caused by legal illiteracy, by people suffering in silence and afraid to say ‘no’ as their rights and their dignity are debased, disrespected and ignored. We have seen the long shadows such mistreatment in a legal vacuum can throw - the lives half lived, the potential lost and the hurt and despair still etched into the faces of adult men and women as they finally get to tell their stories, to demand compensation and apologies and to at last receive an acknowledgement that wrong was done.
It has been a bitter and sobering lesson and one that has made us determined that our nation’s children and our other vulnerable citizens will, in future, have a voice, be aware of their legal rights, know how to speak up and will be assured of the protection of the law when they are suffering.
It has been said that we cannot always build the future for our youth but we can build our youth for the future. Empowering people and educating them about their legal rights is not always an easy task but it is an essential one if we are to create and maintain a fair and just society, a society where there is a level playing field and one where human rights will always be at the centre of every agenda. If we are to maintain that society we need to ensure that age, language barriers, cultural marginalisation or an early exit from formal education do not lead to situations where young, old or vulnerable people exist in legal twilight zones where they can be misled, exploited or harmed by dishonest individuals, or by dysfunctional, careless, corrupt or biased systems that fail in their sacred duty of care.
Thomas Jefferson has said "I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.” The law and all that it represents for the safety and sustainability of a decent society is far too important to be regarded as the exclusive preserve of the legal profession. If we are to ensure that the protection of the law and the vindication of human rights are truly available to all, we need to find ways of hard-wiring that necessary knowledge and awareness into people from a young age.
Legal education should not just begin in the universities or law schools; it should form an appropriate part of the primary and secondary curriculum so that children have a basic grounding in the portfolio of rights and responsibilities that impact on their lives and which kick in long, long before they reach adulthood. The age of criminal responsibility, of sexual consent, of contractual capability, of sufficient maturity to choose between parents in a family breakdown situation - these things and a hundred more impact on and have serious consequences for children every single day in our societies. We need to ask ourselves how much do they know, how much do they need to know and how do we help them to become legally literate in effective age appropriate ways?
We already know that poverty, low literacy, lack of communication skills or unfamiliarity with public services automatically disadvantage those who are marginalised or underprivileged.
If we are to have inclusive legal processes that truly enhance rights and which do not exclude large sectors of society, it is essential that there is joined-up thinking and communication between all those involved with the education, protection and development of our children, those who work with our migrant community and those who work to safeguard the wellbeing of all those at risk. Such a joined up approach would yield considerable benefits in terms of the quality of national laws and practices that address the denial of rights to the vulnerable and exhort our citizens to socially responsible behaviour - whether that involves supporting victims of domestic violence or tackling workplace exploitation, racism, child abuse, school bullying, homophobia, and all other acts that diminish the human person and switch off lights in their lives.
For well over a century your society has dedicated itself to these kinds of debates which are essential if the law and the protection it affords to all of our people is to continue to be the bulwark of a stable, fair, inclusive and decent society. Your important work and discussion does a huge service to all legal practitioners who care about and love the law and, above all, to our vulnerable citizens who are critically dependent on the rights and protections it affords and who could with your help and advocacy be much better prepared than they currently are.
Finally, amid your important deliberations, I hope you will find time to engage with some of the cultural and recreational attractions that Dublin has to offer and I wish you all every success with the important work you will be doing over your five days here in Ireland.
Thank you very much for your kind attention.