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International agreements have been formed among peoples of the world for thousands of years. Efforts to codify them and the rules that bind them finally resulted in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969), which was drafted by the International Law Commission of the United Nations, and which came into force in 1980. Treaties have traditionally been worked out between and among nations, taking into account the principles of international law, domestic law of nations, and customary, or unwritten traditional law. All of these elements have equal weight in the establishment of the agreement. The terminology for such agreements is varied: convention, protocol, covenant charter, statute, act, declaration, are some of the terms equal to an agreement known as a "treaty".

The practice has evolved into a more complex process in the international community today. IGO's (Inter Governmental Organizations), NGO's (Non Governmental Organizations have the power to form agreements, which can be bi-lateral (two parties) or multi-lateral (several parties) in nature. The agreements are often signed at a conference or gathering of parties. After a country has signed it must ratify the treaty. Once it is ratified, the country is a party and is legally bound by terms of the treaty.

If a country does not accept every provision of the treaty, it has the option to limit complete application of the treaty. This action results in "reservations" by the parties and must be duly noted. Because a country has signed a treaty, it does not automatically lead to ratification. There may also be some domestic legislation, required by a country, that must be implemented to make the agreement effective.Therefore it is important to research the status of a treaty as well as the full text of the treaty.  A party to a treaty may make "declarations" about which provisions it will follow in applying the treaty. The "working papers" must then be researched.

A good resource for an introduction and for research guides is the American Society of International Law (ASIL) web site. Divided into topics dealing with international law, the site is a comprehensive one for all areas.  It has the most detailed chapter for explanation and links to sources for treaty material.

Another excellent web site for guides to researching the various ways international agreements are handled is the Harvard library (ILS) web site. The guides on "How to find a treaty when you have a citation", and "How to find a treaty when you don't have a citation" are valuable as well as guides to the U.N. treaties, other international organizations and foreign countries.

    Treaties which involve many parties, and to which the U.S. is not necessarily a party.

A. INTERNET SITES:

United Nations Treaty Collection:

This site is the largest treaty collection on the Internet and is now subscription-based. The Loyola Law Library does subscribe and the database is accessible from the "Research Quick Links" page from the online catalog.  There are about 30,000 treaties available in English, French and any other language which was used. Type of agreement, date of signature, entry into force and names of parties are given. A Treaty Reference Guide is very useful and is available on the UN Treaty Series website.

Multilaterals Project - Fletcher School of Diplomacy

This is an early site and one of the most well-organized, at Tufts University. This project covers numerous treaties, starting in 1899. They are arranged chronologically and also by subject. The site supports full text searching and gives status of treaties.

University of Minnesota Human Rights Web site

Along with ASIL which has a detailed chapter on human rights research, this site has one of the largest collections of human rights treaties. a meta-search engine helps the researcher find the major human rights instruments along with status information, making it a very important site

WorldLII

Treaty databases such as the Australian treaty library, the Hong Kong treaty database and South Pacific treaties are included. This site is part of a much larger collaborative project of Internet databases that have combined to provide international and foreign law information. Search capabilities provide ease of use.

The Avalon Project at Yale Law School

An excellent site for older treaties and other documents, it covers pre-18th Century treaties to the 21st Century.

Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII)

Mentioned because it is the parent site for the World Law sites that have since evolved, and was one of the first country sites to publish treaty information on the Internet. All countries deal with the publication of agreements in a different way. Some have treaty series as printed publications. Australia, the Netherlands, and France are countries that have their treaties completely online. This database not only has complete documents for Australian treaties, it has a database of global treaties under World Law: Treaties. http://www.austlii.edu.au/links/2266.html
 
 

IGO, NGO INTERNET SITES: include treaties relevant to the organization or subject focus of the sponsor.
 

European Union or Europa

Treaties that led to formation of the EU can be found at the web site. If the EU is a treaty partner, the treaties are published in the Official Journal of the European Communities.Legislation, or the L series. Only the last three months can be found at the web site. WESTLAW has the OJ back to 1952.
 

Organization of American States

Beginning with the Charter establishing the OAS, one can research OAS issues, topics ranging from human rights to trade or terrorism. Treaty information can be found under "Documents".They are approved within the framework of the OAS and may be searched by year, by subject and alphabetically.

International Labour Organization

The ILO is an agency of the United Nations which has become an entity in its own right promoting labor standard and human rights in the work place throughout the world. Ilolex is the database which contains the ILO conventions.

World Trade Organization

An organization set up to promote democracy in world trade and to settle disputes involving trade issues, the organization has dealt with much controversy concerning its role. The agreements can be found under "Documents" at the web site.

STATUS AND BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

NOTE:   IGO's and NGO's may have a "secretariat",( the UN, ILO and WTO are examples) which is an entity to administer the all facets of the treaty. Besides holding the text of the treaty, it tracks signature and ratification, monitors compliance and holds other documents basic to the treaty. These documents are called "travaux preparatoire", and, along with status and reservations of the treaty, they may be difficult to locate. Finding the legislative history of a treaty is a challenge. If it involves a country, the government offices of that country have to be contacted. Some IGO's publish their own preparatory texts and they may be available on the Internet site.

B. PRINT SOURCES FOR CURRENT TREATIES:

United Nations Treaty Series: Treaties and International Agreements Registered or filed and Recorded with the Secretariat of the United Nations, 1946-Present.

(UNTS) Not complete; a considerable number of treaties are not registered or reproduced, because many nations do not submit their treaties. It is still the most complete source available. Published treaties appear in their official language, followed by English or French translations if needed. Published in order of their registration with the Secretariat. The UNTS has a Cumulative Index (KZ 172 .T74) which began with the first hundred volumes and is now published every fifty volumes.
KZ 172 .T74 and Micro JX 170 .U35

Multilateral Treaties Deposited with the Secretary-General, 1981-Present.

A comprehensive list of signatures, ratifications, accessions, reservations, and objections of various treaties. The status of current treaties, which ones are in force, which are being amended is given. This is an excellent source for finding and updating the status of treaties. Divided by broad subjects, it is a chronological arrangement within those subjects. The most up-to-date version is found at the UN web site.
KZ 171.M86

International Legal Materials, 1962-Present. American Society of International Law. Published six times annually.

The single best source for locating text of recent bilateral and multilateral treaties, it contains various documents which relate to legal aspects of public and private international relations. Reprints texts of many treaties and documents before they become available. Searchable versions of ILM are found on LEXIS (INTLAW; ILM) and WESTLAW (ILM)
KZ 64 .I58

American Journal of International Law, has a regular column called "Contemporary Practice of the United States Relating to International Law" on treaty information.
Journals - 3^rd Floor

Multilateral Treaties: Index and Current Status by Bowman & Harris

It provides multiples sources for text and parties to a treaty. It is arranged chronologically so it is useful if you know only the date of the treaty. It is current through 1984.
KZ 118 .B69 1984

Multilateral Treaty Calendar by Christian Wiktor

It provides the same information as Bowman & Harris but includes a larger number of treaties and it is arranged chronologically as is the above index. It is current through 1995.
KZ 118 .W5 1998

Consolidated Treaty Series, 1648-1919. Edited by Clive Parry. Oceana Publications.

Attempts to reprint original text and official translations in this time period. Arrangement is chronological and summaries provided if no translation available.
KZ 120.P35

League of Nations Treaty Series, 1920-1946

Covers treaties between members, and between members/non-members of the League. Each volume covers several years, contains chronological index of contents as well as alphabetical country and subject indexes.
KZ 170.5 .T74

All countries deal with treaty sources in slightly different way. Some countries may have published series for treaties. The U.S., England, Australia (online series), Canada, France, Germany, The Netherlands, New Zealand and South Africa are examples. Individual countries may publish only in the Official Gazette for the country. The government offices of the country may have to be contacted. There is an index for bilateral treaties which ceased in 1980. It is the World Treaty Index at KZ 173 .R64 1983, and may be useful for older treaties.

Government Web sites may publish either indexes to treaties or the full-text of treaties. A good way to access these is through the Northwestern University government publications web site which has a comprehensive list of foreign countries and documents that can be found.