The International Law Review and the International Law Society present The Twelfth Blaine Sloan Lecture on International Law
THE LEGALITY AND EFFECTS OF THE UNITED NATIONS SANCTIONS AGAINST IRAQ by:
RAMSEY CLARK Former United States Attorney General
MONDAY, MARCH 16, 1998, 7:00 P.M. at Pace University School of Law, The Robert B. Fleming Moot Court, Room 78, North Broadway White Plains, New York
RAMSEY CLARK
Since 1960, Ramsey Clark has fought many of the defining battles on behalf of civil liberties and social justice in America and abroad. After leaving the United States Marine Corps in 1946, Mr. Clark attended the University of Texas and later received his J.D. from the University of Chicago in 1950. After nine years of private practice in Dallas, Texas, he joined the Justice Department in 1961, ultimately reaching the position of Attorney General under President Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1967, Mr. Clark was sworn in as Attorney General by United States Supreme Court Justice, Tom C. Clark, his father.
As Attorney General Mr. Clark supervised the enforcement of federal court orders requiring the admission of James Meredith to the University of Mississippi and protecting the civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery and headed the presidential task force on the Watts riots. He also supervised the executive involvement in and drafting of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Mr. Clark also marshaled the Justice Department's resources on behalf of consumers by vigorously opposing anti-competitive practices in the automobile, media, and computer industries.
Mr. Clark's departure from government service did not end his unwavering pursuit of social justice. Since returning to private practice, Mr. Clark has championed an increasingly broad range of issues at home an abroad. As general counsel of the Alaska Federation of Natives, he secured the largest settlement of native land claims in history. He argued or briefed the first Freedom of Information Act case and various First Amendment, peace movement, civil rights and criminal cases in the United States Supreme Court.
While people were fleeing Iraq in fear of the impending crisis, Mr. Clark traveled to Iraq during the 1991 bombing. Since 1991, Mr. Clark has frequently traveled to Iraq on fact finding and humanitarian missions. Witnessing hunger, malnurtirion, sickness, and death afflicted upon the entire Iraqi population, Mr. Clark is leading the campaign to end the sanctions against Iraq. He is founder of the International Action Center in New York and founder of the Medicine for Iraq Campaign.
Mr. Clark is the author of Crime in America, The Fire This Time, The Role of Supreme Court (with Senator Sam J. Ervin, Jr.) and has published and lectured widely on a number of human rights issues. Mr. Clark is the recipient of honorary degrees from more than twenty universities.
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THE BLAINE SLOAN LECTURE SERIES honors Blaine Sloan, Professor Emeritus of International Law and Organization at Pace University School of Law, for developing the international law studies program at Pace.
A member of the United Nations Legal Office for three decades and Director of the General Legal Division, Professor Sloan has contributed significantly to the development of private and public international law. He represented the Secretary General at the 1978 U.N. Conference on the Carriage of Goods by Sea; at the sessions from 1969-1978 of the U.N. Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL); and at the 1966-1978 sessions of the Legal Sub-Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. His U.N. service involved him in that organization's work on Vietnam, relief for Palestinian refugees, peacekeeping in the Middle East, the U.N. Commission on Korea, and as Legal Advisor to Security Council sessions in Africa and Latin America.