Human Rights Declaration, Articles 19 and 20

This stretch of the declaration covers opinion, expression, assembly, and association. The declaration runs to thirty numbered articles in all. René Cassin, one of the drafters, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1968. The numbers and the short clauses turn this passage into a workout for the digit row. Article twenty-one, which follows, goes on to say that the will of the people is the basis of authority.

Where this text comes fromNothing in this document binds anyone. It is a declaration, not a treaty, and it creates no obligation a court can enforce, which is exactly why the drafters fought over every word: the text had no teeth, so its only power was going to be how precisely it was phrased. Seventy-odd years later it is the most translated document in the world, and national constitutions quote it directly. The fragment closes at the end of article twenty, on the right not to be forced into an association.

What you might not noticeThe right to freedom of expression here explicitly covers receiving information regardless of frontiers, a phrase written in 1948 with radio and print in mind, decades before anyone needed it for a network. Source

What it trainsSix digits in 380 characters, which is the first thing to notice: the article numbers force the hand up to the number row and back down, twice, in a passage that is otherwise plain prose. Five sentences average twelve words, so full stops arrive constantly and each one is a chance to lose your place in the numbering. Two other stretches of the declaration here run to a similar rhythm, which makes this typical of the section rather than exceptional. Only one capital falls inside a sentence, and there is a single comma in the whole fragment. The longest word is interference, twelve letters, sitting where the clause changes direction.

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