Seventy years ago, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. Since then, that document has provided a beacon for citizens and activists, and laid out for governments and their leaders the basic rights that their publics should enjoy. The declaration has been violated or ignored countless times, but it has also facilitated great progress. When governments fall short, they should be held accountable for their failures, but we should also acknowledge the wisdom and the idealism of the authors of that document, and strive to match them.

The declaration was produced by the U.N. Human Rights Commission, which was chaired and animated by Eleanor Roosevelt, widow of the 32nd president of the United States. She was joined by 17 other members who came from a range of political, cultural and religious backgrounds. They worked against the backdrop of two world wars, the deaths of millions of human beings and the prospect of a nuclear conflagration that threatened unprecedented destruction. Their discussion took a new and fundamentally different starting point as Emilio Alvarez Icaza Longoria, a Mexican representative, explained: "It was the first time, when talking about human rights, that we are talking not about 'citizens' but about 'human beings' — a critical difference."

Two years of negotiations yielded a document that was put before the General Assembly on Dec. 10, 1948, for a vote. As she submitted the charter for consideration, Roosevelt argued that the world was "at the threshold of a great event both in the life of the United Nations and in the life of mankind. This declaration may well become the international Magna Carta for all men everywhere."