| The path of the United States to integrating human rights into the constant practice of its foreign affairs policy has been long and circuitous. While discourse supporting the ideals of civic liberties and social, economic and cultural rights was widely used since 1776, the actual level of political and bureaucratic interest in American activism transforming international relations into a meaningful scrutiny of domestic conduct abroad, and pledging reform in troubled areas, took centuries to materialize.; Substantive change in the pattern of subordinating issues of human rights to strategic, commercial and political interests began with Woodrow Wilson's ambitious plan to revolutionize global politics in the aftermath of World War I. It was heightened by Franklin Delano Roosevelt's goals during World War II.; The public drive to position the U.S. as the repository of universal rights culminated with Jimmy Carter's 1976 presidential campaign and his initial speeches in 1977. The Carter Administration, in turn, made a concerted administrative attempt in 1977 to favor human rights in its policy, but much of Carter's genuine intentions were subverted already during his first year in office by the national security apparatus and by contentious Cold War realities. |
