Sen. defeats treaty opposed by family groups

[Revmitchell]

WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. Senate fell short in its bid to ratify a treaty critics charged could subvert parental authority and American sovereignty, as well as expand abortions.


Senators voted 61-38 Tuesday (Dec. 4) for the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (CRPD) but failed to achieve the two-thirds majority required in the Senate to approve a treaty. The CRPD's foes had expressed hope they had the votes to prevent ratification, but they acknowledged senators were under intense pressure to support the controversial treaty.

The treaty's opponents applauded its failure.

"I'm delighted that this ignominious treaty has been sent to the ash heap of history where it belongs and that even a lame-duck Senate understood the intrusions upon American sovereignty that were unacceptable," said Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Michael Smith, president of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), described the treaty's defeat in an email to supporters as "a great victory for parental rights, homeschool freedom, and children with special needs."

http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39290

 

[InTheLight]

WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. Senate fell short in its bid to ratify a treaty critics charged could subvert parental authority and American sovereignty, as well as expand abortions.


Senators voted 61-38 Tuesday (Dec. 4) for the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (CRPD) but failed to achieve the two-thirds majority required in the Senate to approve a treaty. The CRPD's foes had expressed hope they had the votes to prevent ratification, but they acknowledged senators were under intense pressure to support the controversial treaty.

The treaty's opponents applauded its failure.

"I'm delighted that this ignominious treaty has been sent to the ash heap of history where it belongs and that even a lame-duck Senate understood the intrusions upon American sovereignty that were unacceptable," said Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Michael Smith, president of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), described the treaty's defeat in an email to supporters as "a great victory for parental rights, homeschool freedom, and children with special needs."

http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39290

Add this to the list of failed U.N. treaties, failed U.N. resolutions, failed U.N. directives, failed U.N. initiatives, and failed U.N. everything, when it comes to usurping the U.S. constitution and U.S. laws.

Conspiracy theorists take note--the U.N. is a powerless organization that is a waste of U.S. funding.

 

[General Mung Beans]

You do realize that this was a treaty negotiated by Bush the Greater and meant to help disabled people and children? This was the sort of nonsense the John Birchers used to stand on. Yes it has little legal force but OTOH it does send a moral message.

 

[Revmitchell]

Good for the Birchers! :thumbs: We do not need the UN to send a good message. And Americans by and large will not put up with anyone outside of the US having control over what happens within the US.

 

[Oldtimer]

Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (Treaty Doc. 112-7)
Testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
July 12, 2012

http://www.heritage.org/research/te...on-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities

The United States should not ratify the CRPD if membership would not advance U.S. national interests at home or abroad. The Administration concedes that U.S. membership in the Convention would not advance the cause of persons with disabilities living in the United States since the United States already has in place comprehensive statutory, regulatory, and enforcement mechanisms regarding disability rights.

The question remains whether membership in the Convention would advance national interests in the international sphere. Joining the Convention is unlikely to advance U.S. national interests abroad, but instead would obligate the United States to answer to a committee of “disability experts” in violation of principles of U.S. sovereignty. The United States need not become party to the Convention to demonstrate its strong commitment to disability rights to the international community. Nor is there any evidence that U.S. ratification would enhance the ability of the U.S. government or non-governmental organizations to promote disability rights in foreign countries.

-----------
Abuses by Treaty Committees. Human rights treaty committees have been known to make demands of states parties that fall well outside the scope of the subject matter of the treaty and that conflict with the legal, social, economic, and cultural traditions and norms of states parties. This has especially been the case with the United States.

For instance, in February 2008, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination reviewed the U.S. record on racial discrimination and issued a report directing the United States to change its policies on a series of political causes completely divorced from the issues of race and racial discrimination. Specifically, the committee urged the United States to guarantee effective judicial review to the foreign unlawful enemy combatants held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, prevent U.S. corporations from abusing the rights of indigenous populations in other countries, place a moratorium on the death penalty, restore voting rights to convicted felons, and other matters completely unrelated or only tangentially related to racial discrimination.[18]

The committees overseeing the enforcement of other human rights treaties to which the United States is not a party often recommend changes in policies that are outside of traditional American norms. For example, the committee that oversees the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) regularly advocates that states decriminalize prostitution, expand access to abortion, devalue the role of women as mothers, reduce parental authority, and implement strict numerical gender quotas in the government and private sectors.[19]

The U.S. has reason to expect that the experts on the CRPD Committee will give short shrift to U.S. sovereignty, laws, regulations and norms, and embark on similar forays in pursuit of a broader agenda of social engineering unrelated to disability rights.

Please take the time to read the entire testimony. To read what both Clinton and Bush had to say about the power of the CRPD Committee.

Please read the sections on:
Non-Self-Execution (including what was omitted from the Transmittal).
"Reproductive Health”
Defining the Convention’s Terms

Judge for yourself as to what is and isn't contained in what would become the law of OUR land, if it had passed.

 

[General Mung Beans]

Good for the Birchers! :thumbs: We do not need the UN to send a good message. And Americans by and large will not put up with anyone outside of the US having control over what happens within the US.

As noted by Oldtimer, the treaty wouldn't have done that, the events of the last few decades should make clear that the UN cannot do anything substantive without American backing while America can do so without the UN (see the Iraq War).

 

[Mexdeaf]

It was window dressing at best.

 

[InTheLight]

the events of the last few decades should make clear that the UN cannot do anything substantive without American backing while America can do so without the UN (see the Iraq War).

Thanks for bringing that up. Actually America (the Bushes) played the UN like a fiddle when it came to Kuwait and Iraq. In Kuwait, George Bush Sr. masterfully got the UN to pass resolutions calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein's troops from Kuwait BEFORE he went to the US Senate and House and did the same. Are the liberal Dems going to say no after the UN said yes?

George W. did pretty much the same thing.

 

[Aaron]

Senators voted 61-38 Tuesday (Dec. 4) for the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (CRPD)...

Very disturbing . . . but not surprising.

 

[Aaron]

Conspiracy theorists take note--the U.N. is a powerless organization that is a waste of U.S. funding.

They're only powerless to the U.S. Ask other nations of the weak and powerless U.N. troops occupying their lands.

The danger to the U.S. is its own senate.

 

[Oldtimer]

As noted by Oldtimer, the treaty wouldn't have done that, the events of the last few decades should make clear that the UN cannot do anything substantive without American backing while America can do so without the UN (see the Iraq War).

Please read the Non-Self Execeution portion of the earlier link that I provided.

Non-Self-Execution

U.S. ratification of the Convention would make it “the supreme Law of the Land” under the supremacy clause of the Constitution.[27] Although ratification would constitute a commitment under international law, the text of the Convention gives no indication that its drafters intended its provisions to be automatically enforceable under the domestic law of the states parties.[28]

Nevertheless, to protect against any assertion to the contrary and as recommended in the Transmittal Package, this Committee should submit a declaration that the Convention is not self-executing, meaning that its provisions would not be enforceable in U.S. courts. Private causes of action or other new avenues of litigation would thus require passage of federal legislation specifically implementing the Convention’s terms.[29]

“Non-self-executing” declarations are common. In fact, the United States has entered such declarations as a condition for ratifying the three major human rights treaties to which it is a party: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR),[30] the International Covenant on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (ICERD),[31] and the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT).[32] The non-self-executing declaration has also been proposed as a condition for CEDAW ratification.[33]

Of course, the United States would be fully justified in entering such a declaration. Existing state and federal legislation already provide private causes of action for the disabled in the United States, including for instances of discrimination in employment, public accommodations, transportation, telecommunications, housing and other areas.[34]

The Transmittal Package recommends the inclusion of a non-self-executing declaration, but for some reason includes a proviso that “it is not necessary that such Declaration be included in the instrument of ratification deposited by the President.”[35] Excluding the declaration would be a departure from U.S. past practice, as the non-self-execution declaration has been included in the U.S. instrument of ratification in connection with the ICCPR, ICERD, and CAT.

It appears that many view the UN taking control of the US is via boots on the ground wearing blue hats. Or some other event as equally significant. It's not going to work that way folks. Power to govern this land is slowly, quietly, steadily, moving from Washington to New York.

Did some massive piece of legislation create the 47% spoken of prior to the elections? No. It came about through a series of "help the poor" laws that were passed over time, creating our "entitled" society. Every time another quiet submission to the UN happens, the UN becomes more "entitled" to dictate our governance. According to this testimony before the Senate Committee, there was a "departure from U.S. past practice".

Thinking that the UN, headquartered on our own shores, is a paper tiger is an illusion that's being fostered by those who aren't ready to awaken the sleeping giant in NY.