“Slay This Monster”: the United States and Opposition to the Rome Statute on the International Criminal Court

States often invoke international norms to justify their foreign policymaking. However, the absence of a centralized authority capable of enforcing and providing unambiguous interpretations of norms often leaves states, particularly great powers, free to decide whether to recognize or reject the legitimacy of norms. Operating in a decentralized system, international norms crucially depend on state support for their legitimacy and effectiveness. Variations in the way states respond to norms call for an investigation into the domestic conditions that lead states to recognize or reject their legitimacy. These conditions will be investigated through a qualitative analysis of US foreign policy towards the norms contained in the 1998 Rome Statute on the International Criminal Court. The analysis identifies the actors that were responsible for how this group of norms was interpreted at the domestic level and the transmitters through which they came to be viewed as illegitimate and inconsistent with US interests.