In 1789 the people of France carried out the abolition of absolute monarchy and the establishment of the first French Republic. Only six weeks after the storming of the Bastille, and only three weeks after the abolition of feudalism, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (French: Déclaration des Droits de l’Homme et du Citoyen) was adopted by the National Constituent Assembly as the first step towards writing a constitution for the Republic of France.
The Declaration proclaims that all citizens must be guaranteed the rights of “liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression”. This argues that the necessity of the law stems from the fact that “… the exercise of the natural rights of each man has only those boundaries which assure other members of society the enjoyment of these same rights”. Therefore, the Declaration sees the law as “an expression of the general will”, which is intended to promote this equality of rights and to prohibit “only actions harmful to society”.
The First Geneva Convention (1864)
The original document of the first Geneva Convention in 1864 stipulated the care of wounded soldiers.
In 1864, sixteen European countries and several American states attended a conference in Geneva, at the invitation of the Swiss Federal Council, on the initiative of the Geneva Committee. The diplomatic conference was held to adopt a convention for the treatment of soldiers wounded in combat.The fundamental principles were established in the Convention and were maintained by later Geneva Conventions specifying the obligation to extend care, without discrimination, to wounded or sick military personnel, maintaining respect for them and for the brand of transport of medical personnel and equipment. distinguished by the red cross on a white background.
