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In this article, we attempt to explain why it took twenty-five years for France to ratify the European Convention on Human Rights, in the framework of the Council of Europe, between 1950 and 1974, despite considering itself as the country of Human Rights on the international scene and displaying enthusiasm during the drafting of the text. We aim to show that political reasons were more important than legal ones here, and were largely influenced by the national political and legal context as well as the European and international one. All these explanations are connected and need to be considered. We also show how studying the history of the ratification of this text is interesting in the way that it makes us take into account societal developments and move beyond a purely legal analysis.