In Rene Trujillo's book "Human Rights in the 'Age of Discovery,'" the introduction explains the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Declaration was adopted in 1948 by the United Nations and was ratified by 48 nations. Eleanor Roosevelt was the chair of the commission that wrote it and represented the United States in the United Nations. Most national constitutions incorporate some of the Declaration's principles and human rights organizations think of the Declaration as a kind of constitution, stating rights and freedoms.

When Trujillo tells us about Francisco de Vitoria's opposition to the way that the Spaniards were treating the Western Hemisphere's native people when they discovered the "new" world. Vitoria came up with an alternative to the theology and philosophy of repression that was widely known in his time (right around the 1500's). The thesis of his alternative had 3 principles: all human beings have a fundamental right to...