The Justiciability of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights

Rights guaranteed in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR),1 including a focus on the rights to work and to adequate working conditions, adequate living conditions, health, education, social security, and participation in cultural life, are not contained in the United States Constitution. The framers of the Constitution were primarily concerned with guaranteeing freedom from government. Thus, the writ of habeas corpus and the right to a jury trial are among the few individual rights explicitly contained in the original Constitution. These are the so-called negative rights or negative limits on the states’ power to deprive a person of liberty or property; and positive rights, those specific rights that the government should provide, are not included. In 1791, the Constitution was amended by the addition of the first ten amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, including the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment;2 and following the Civil War additional amendments, primarily containing civil and political rights, not economic and social rights, were added. The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment applies only to the states, but equal protection principles are also applicable to the federal government under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.3

Bill of rights · Constitution · Cultural rights · Fundamental rights · Habeas corpus · Human rights · International human rights law · Justiciability · Limited government · Linguistic rights · Political science · Reservation of rights · Right to property · Rights of Nature · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Legal and Constitutional Studies · Legal Systems and Judicial Processes

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  Open Access•Stephen Phillips•Human Rights Review•2023

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