The Nuremberg Laws and National Sovereignty

Should the importance of human rights outweigh that of national sovereignty? National sovereignty is the idea that nation states have a right to exist and be free from interference. In other words, governments can do whatever they wish, to whomever they wish, in their own country. Whatever happens inside their own borders is their business. That belief was challenged in the second half of the twentieth century. Two events in one German city show how the Second World War changed the debate.

On September 15, 1935, the Nazi Party staged a huge rally in Nuremberg, Germany. There, the Nazi leadership enacted the Nuremberg Laws. They singled out Germany’s Jewish population. The laws came from Nazi ideology, an extreme form of eugenics, and social Darwinism.¹ Such ideas were popular with imperialists in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. The Nuremberg Laws defined German Jews not by their religion but by their ancestry. They were stripped of citizenship. The laws placed restrictions on where they could work and who they could marry.

Adolf Hitler used the Nuremberg Laws to portray Jews as the enemy of the German people. The laws provided the legal framework for ridding Germany society of anyone the Nazis felt was not a “pure” German. The stage was set for the atrocities of the Holocaust. In addition to the murder of some 6 million Jews, the Nazis put to death millions of disabled, black, Roma, and gay people. Anyone who did not fit their racial and social ideology was a target. The Nuremberg Laws enforced Hitler’s belief: He could do whatever he wanted to whomever he wanted inside his borders.

The United Nations and the paradox of human rights

The Second World War, the most destructive conflict in history, ended in 1945. In its aftermath, the victorious allied powers wanted to build a peaceful world order. Nazi crimes convinced them to take international action to prevent such acts and wars from happening again. They were inspired in part by President Franklin Roosevelt’s “Four Freedoms” speech in 1941. Human rights advocates argued that international recognition of human rights was necessary to ensure peace and security. Debates about human rights were central at the San Francisco Conference in 1945. There, the Allies met to create the United Nations. Its Charter was signed by 50 countries in June of 1945.

The UN Charter contains a fundamental problem, though. The introduction and very first article state a “faith in fundamental human rights.” The very next part of the Charter, Article 2, guarantees national sovereignty. It forbids the United Nations from getting involved in any matters “within the domestic jurisdiction of any state.” These two articles present a paradox (contradiction). The United Nations was claiming authority to prevent and punish governments for human rights abuses. However, governments were still supposed to be free to do whatever they wished inside their national borders.

The Nuremberg trials started just five months after the signing of the United Nations Charter. They tried to address this paradox. The United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France agreed to bring the leadership of the Nazi party to trial. The trials took ideas about human rights and turned them into formal international laws. It was a historical first. The international community had never before prosecuted the leaders of a major power.

The Nuremberg Trials

The Nuremberg trials included a total of thirteen trials of Nazi officials. Held from 1945 to 1949, they took place in the same city where Hitler had declared the Nuremberg Laws ten years earlier. The trials sought to hold Germany’s leaders accountable for their crimes: crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.

These trials were something new. They represented the idea that states and national leaders could be punished for violating the rights of their own citizens. For their part, the German leaders on trial defended their actions on the grounds of national sovereignty. Hermann Goering, a top Nazi leader, insisted, “That was our right! We were a sovereign state and that was strictly our business.” But the Nuremberg trials rejected that principle, and Goering was convicted and sentenced to death. However, he committed suicide in his jail cell the night before his execution.

International Law and human rights

The Nuremberg trials made the case for a set of rules that are more important than the laws of any one nation state. This is known as international law. It sets expectations for how nation states interact with each other.

The Nuremberg Principles were one outcome of the Nuremberg trials. These seven rules explain what a war crime is. The principles also make it clear that “I was just following orders” is not an acceptable defense for war crimes. The Nuremberg Principles also guided new definitions of human rights. Historians credit the Nuremberg trials with laying the foundations for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948). They also guided the development of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948).

The Nuremberg trials guided the human rights movement that followed. Without international authority over human rights abuses within national borders, there could be no global standard for human rights. This is the key difference between human rights and civil rights. Civil rights are rights you are entitled to because you are a citizen of a country. The rights of French citizens differ from the rights of Chinese citizens, for example. Human rights, on the other hand, are rights that we have because we are human beings.

The historian Lynn Hunt argues that human rights require three interlocking qualities: “Rights must be natural (inherent in human beings); equal (the same for everyone); and universal (applicable everywhere).” Theoretically, human rights do not depend on where you come from.

A victor’s peace and power over principles

The Nuremberg trials instilled new understandings about human rights. People around the world have used them to protect themselves from the authority of nation states. Individuals and groups may ask international organizations to confront governments they accuse of violating their human rights. The European Court of Human Rights has delivered more than 10,000 judgements since 1959. Nuremberg also served as a model for the International Criminal Court. The ICC was created in 1998.

After the Second World War, many American politicians resisted calls for stronger support of human rights. Several senators argued that international agreements would threaten the independence of the United States. They feared such treaties could force the country to answer to the UN.

Eleanor Roosevelt led the committee that wrote the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. She wanted a binding treaty that would bring human rights firmly into international law. President Harry Truman instructed Roosevelt against that. He asked her to draft a non-binding resolution (declaration or oath) instead. The Universal Declaration is the most translated document in history. However, after its drafting, representatives of the British Empire ran a secret campaign at the United Nations. They limited the document’s translation into the languages of Britain’s colonies. The United States and Great Britain had just fought a war and held trials that confronted Nazi crimes and imperialism. Yet, both countries feared being held accountable by the United Nations.

Despite these limitations, the Nuremberg trials changed the world. Their rulings offered a check on even the world’s strongest powers. For instance, in 1946, 1947, and 1951, several African American rights organizations appealed to the United Nations. They wanted UN support in confronting racial inequality and segregation in the United States.

The Nuremberg trials led to international commitments to human rights. They did little to weaken the principle of national sovereignty. Still, human rights advocates have used international law to challenge national governments. They have refused to accept the idea that governments can do whatever they want inside their own borders.

1 Theories of Social Darwinism emerged in the nineteenth century. These theories attempted to take biological theories and apply them to society, especially the notion of “survival of the fittest.” Social Darwinism has been discredited as bad science and for its racist undertones.