Manifesto
of Charter 77
In
the Czechoslovak Register of Laws No. 120 of October 13, 1976,
texts were published of the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, and of the International Covenant on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights, which were signed on behalf of our
republic in 1968, reiterated at Helsinki in 1975 and came into
force in our country on March 23, 1976. From that date our citizens
have enjoyed the rights, and our state the duties, ensuing from
them.
The
human rights and freedoms underwritten by these covenants constitute
features of civilized life for which many progressive movements
have striven throughout history and whose codification could greatly
assist humane developments in our society.
We
accordingly welcome the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic's accession
to those agreements.
Their
publication, however, serves as a powerful reminder of the extent
to which basic human rights in our country exist, regrettably,
on paper alone.
The
right to freedom of expression, for example, guaranteed by Article
19 of the first-mentioned covenant, is in our case purely illusory.
Tens of thousands of our citizens are prevented from working in
their own fields for the sole reason that they hold views differing
from official ones, and are discriminated against and harassed
in all kinds of ways by the authorities and public organizations.
Deprived as they are of any means to defend themselves, they become
victims of a virtual apartheid.
Hundreds
of thousands of other citizens are denied that "freedom from
fear" mentioned in the preamble to the first covenant, being
condemned to the constant risk of unemployment or other penalties
if they voice their own opinions.
In
violation of Article 13 of the second-mentioned covenant, guaranteeing
everyone the right to education, countless young people are prevented
from studying because of their own views or even their parents'.
Innumerable citizens live in fear of their own or their children's
right to education being withdrawn if they should ever speak up
in accordance with their convictions.
Any
exercise of the right to "seek, receive and impart information
and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally,
in writing or in print" or "in the form of art" specified
in Article 19, Clause 2 of the first covenant is followed by extra-judicial
and even judicial sanctions, often in the form of criminal charges,
as in the recent trial of young musicians.
Freedom
of public expression is inhibited by the centralized control of
all the communication media and of publishing and cultural institutions.
No philosophical, political or scientific view or artistic activity
that departs ever so slightly from the narrow bounds of official
ideology or aesthetics is allowed to be published; no open criticism
can be made of abnormal social phenomena; no public defense is
possible against false and insulting charges made in official propaganda
-- the legal protection against "attacks on honor and reputation" clearly
guaranteed by Article 17 of the first covenant is in practice non-existent:
false accusations cannot be rebutted, and any attempt to secure
compensation or correction through the courts is futile; no open
debate is allowed in the domain of thought and art.
Many
scholars, writers, artists and others are penalized for having
legally published or expressed, years ago, opinions which are condemned
by those who hold political power today.
Freedom
of religious confession, emphatically guaranteed by Article 18
of the first covenant, is continually curtailed by arbitrary official
action; by interference with the activity of churchmen, who are
constantly threatened by the refusal of the state to permit them
the exercise of their functions, or by the withdrawal of such permission;
by financial or other transactions against those who express their
religious faith in word or action; by constraints on religious
training and so forth.
One
instrument for the curtailment or in many cases complete elimination
of many civic rights is the system by which all national institutions
and organizations are in effect subject to political directives
from the machinery of the ruling party and to decisions made by
powerful individuals.
The
constitution of the republic, its laws and legal norms do not regulate
the form or content, the issuing or application of such decisions;
they are often only given out verbally, unknown to the public at
large and beyond its powers to check; their originators are responsible
to no one but themselves and their own hierarchy; yet they have
a decisive impact on the decision-making and executive organs of
government, justice, trade unions, interest groups and all other
organizations, of the other political parties, enterprises, factories,
institutions, offices and so on, for whom these instructions have
precedence even before the law.
Where
organizations or individuals, in the interpretation of their rights
and duties, come into conflict with such directives, they cannot
have recourse to any non-party authority, since none such exists.
This constitutes, of course, a serious limitation of the right
ensuing from Articles 21 and 22 of the first-mentioned covenant,
which provides for freedom of association and forbids any restriction
on its exercise, from Article 25 on the right to take part in the
conduct of public affairs, and from Article 26 stipulating equal
protection by the law without discrimination.
This
state of affairs likewise prevents workers and others from exercising
the unrestricted right to establish trade unions and other organizations
to protect their economic and social interests, and from freely
enjoying the right to strike provided for in Clause 1 of Article
8 in the second-mentioned covenant.
Further
civic rights, including the explicit prohibition of "arbitrary
interference with privacy, family, home or correspondence" (Article
17 of the first covenant), are seriously vitiated by the various
forms of interference in the private life of citizens exercised
by the Ministry of the Interior, for example by bugging telephones
and houses, opening mail, following personal movements, searching
homes, setting up networks of neighborhood informers (often recruited
by illicit threats or promises) and in other ways.
The
ministry frequently interferes in employers' decisions, instigates
acts of discrimination by authorities and organizations, brings
weight to bear on the organs of justice and even orchestrates propaganda
campaigns in the media. This activity is governed by no law and,
being clandestine, affords the citizen no chance to defend himself.
In
cases of prosecution on political grounds the investigative and
judicial organs violate the rights of those charged and those defending
them, as guaranteed by Article 14 of the first covenant and indeed
by Czechoslovak law. The prison treatment of those sentenced in
such cases is an affront to their human dignity and a menace to
their health, being aimed at breaking their morale.
Clause
2, Article 12 of the first covenant, guaranteeing every citizen
the right to leave the country, is consistently violated, or under
the pretense of "defense of national security" is subjected
to various unjustifiable conditions (Clause 3). The granting of
entry visas to foreigners is also treated arbitrarily, and many
are unable to visit Czechoslovakia merely because of professional
or personal contacts with those of our citizens who are subject
to discrimination.
Some
of our people -- either in private, at their places of work or
by the only feasible public channel, the foreign media -- have
drawn attention to the systematic violation of human rights and
democratic freedoms and demanded amends in specific cases. But
their pleas have remained largely ignored or been made grounds
for police investigation.
Responsibility
for the maintenance of rights in our country naturally devolves
in the first place on the political and state authorities. Yet
not only on them: everyone bears his share of responsibility for
the conditions that prevail and accordingly also for the observance
of legally enshrined agreements, binding upon all individuals as
well as upon governments.
It
is this sense of co-responsibility, our belief in the importance
of its conscious public acceptance and the general need to give
it new and more effective expression that led us to the idea of
creating Charter 77, whose inception we today publicly announce.
Charter
77 is a loose, informal and open association of people of various
shades of opinion, faiths and professions united by the will to
strive individually and collectively for the respecting of civic
and human rights in our own country and throughout the world --
rights accorded to all men by the two mentioned international covenants,
by the Final Act of the Helsinki conference and by numerous other
international documents opposing war, violence and social or spiritual
oppression, and which are comprehensively laid down in the U.N.
Universal Charter of Human Rights.
Charter
77 springs from a background of friendship and solidarity among
people who share our concern for those ideals that have inspired,
and continue to inspire, their lives and their work.
Charter
77 is not an organization; it has no rules, permanent bodies or
formal membership. It embraces everyone who agrees with its ideas
and participates in its work. It does not form the basis for any
oppositional political activity. Like many similar citizen initiatives
in various countries, West and East, it seeks to promote the general
public interest.
It
does not aim, then, to set out its own platform of political or
social reform or change, but within its own field of impact to
conduct a constructive dialogue with the political and state authorities,
particularly by drawing attention to individual cases where human
and civic frights are violated, to document such grievances and
suggest remedies, to make proposals of a more general character
calculated to reinforce such rights and machinery for protecting
them, to act as an intermediary in situations of conflict which
may lead to violations of rights, and so forth.
By
its symbolic name Charter 77 denotes that it has come into being
at the start of a year proclaimed as Political Prisoners' Year
-- a year in which a conference in Belgrade is due to review the
implementation of the obligations assumed at Helsinki.
As
signatories, we hereby authorize Professor Dr. Jan Patocka, Dr.
Vaclav Havel and Professor Dr. Jiri Hajek to act as the spokesmen
for the Charter. These spokesmen are endowed with full authority
to represent it vis-a-vis state and other bodies, and the public
at home and abroad, and their signatures attest to the authenticity
of documents issued by the Charter. They will have us and others
who join us as their colleagues taking part in any needful negotiations,
shouldering particular tasks and sharing every responsibility.
We
believe that Charter 77 will help to enable all citizens of Czechoslovakia
to work and live as free human beings.
Prague,
1 January 1977