Part I State Obligations and Rights Protected, Ch.II Civil and Political Rights, Art.24: Right to Equal Protection

Abstract

This chapter assesses the provision on equality before the law laid down in Article 24 of the American Convention on Human Rights (ACHR), which at the same time draws the main logical consequence, namely, that the law must protect individuals without discrimination. On the basis of Article 1-1 of the ACHR, one can only claim to be a victim of discrimination if the right whose exercise or enjoyment that has been infringed is guaranteed by the ACHR. Nevertheless, Article 24 provides autonomous and much broader protection against discriminatory treatment, since equality must be recognized before the “law” in the domestic sense, so that in order to invoke it, it is not necessary to establish that what has been deprived of constitutes a right guaranteed by the ACHR. It is not even necessary to establish that it is a human right at all. The value protected by Article 24, which has its source in the dignity and “unity of the human family,” is that of equality to be respected by the State when it produces and applies law in the broad sense.