I know the Catholic arguments.  All you natural law fans–not to mention those who have read our declaration of independence–can rest assured: I am aware that many people (including those of my creed) believe that people have inherent rights, etc.  However, I also believe, based on empirical experience, that unless those are put in laws, whatever you believe about society is only about as useful as a fairy.  So we need laws, and that’s why the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was so important.  Check this out from one of my favorite Nobel-prize winners of all time:

So what is the underlying argument here? Taking an exclusively legal view of rights, Bentham asserted that for a right to be “real,” it had to be legislated. A right, he said, can only be a “child of law.” This grants no room whatsoever for the public recognition of the importance of certain freedoms, and of the role of these ethically recognized freedoms and rights in providing motivation for fresh legislation. For if human rights are publicly supported claims that can contribute to the basis of legislation, then they function not as children of law, but rather as “parents of law.”

The legitimacy of this way of understanding “moral rights” was well discussed by the great legal theorist H.L.A. Hart. Indeed, Eleanor Roosevelt, in her pioneering move, hoped that the provisions in the Declaration would serve as something like a template for legislation across the world. And to a considerable extent, this has occurred both in national legislation and through regional “human rights laws.” The European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and other such conventions and laws have clearly been inspired by the vision that the Universal Declaration affirmed in 1948. And the impact of the declaration did not stop there.