It is stain enough on our nation’s integrity that, in a moment of reckless cowardice in the face of a bullying administration, the U.S. Congress passed the Military Commissions Act last year. This is the law that, as the New York Times crisply put it in Monday’s editorial, “created a separate, substandard and clearly unconstitutional system of trial and punishment for foreigners.”
Yet, although that dark little piece of legislation is bad, what is far, far worse is the provision contained within it that allowed for the suspension of the Great Writ of Habeas Corpus, which for eight centuries has protected people from being locked up indefinitely without a show of cause.
Today, the Senate is likely to take a step in undoing what it did back 2006, when it votes on the Habeas Corpus Restoration Act.Passage of this bill won’t fix everything, but it will at least reverse the vilest aspect of the Military Commissions Act.
As to why it’s important, the NY Times says it quite well:
The protection from arbitrary arrest, embedded in the Magna Carta and in the Constitution of the United States, is one of the most powerful weapons against tyranny in democracy’s arsenal. Before President Bush, only one American president suspended habeas corpus — Abraham Lincoln, during the Civil War — and the Supreme Court duly struck down that arrogation of power.
In 2004, the Supreme Court again affirmed habeas corpus, declaring that Mr. Bush had no right to revoke the rules of civilized justice at his whim for hundreds of foreigners he declared “illegal enemy combatants.” But Mr. Bush was determined to avoid judicial scrutiny of the extralegal system of prisons he created after the Sept. 11 attacks. With the help of his allies on Capitol Hill, he railroaded the habeas corpus suspension through the Republican-controlled Congress.The administration’s disinformation machine portrayed the debate as a fight between tough-minded conservatives who wanted to defeat terrorism and addled liberals who would coddle the worst kinds of criminals. It was nothing of the kind.
There is nothing conservative about expressing contempt for the Constitution by denying judicial procedure to prisoners who happen not to be Americans…......American justice rests on the principle that the only way to protect the innocent is to treat everyone equally under the law.
(The WaPo also has an editorial on the subject worth reading.)
Lawmakers with any sense from both sides of the aisle support this bill.
Let’s hope they don’t blink.
Unfortunately, the bill isn’t a slam dunk. In fact, the National Review ties itself in series of legal Boy Scout knots trying to show how perfectly swell it is to deny Habeas to anyone the government declares, without due process, to be an enemy combatant.
Frankly, the National Review is not just wrong, it should be ashamed of itself.
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PS: I know I’ve mentioned it before, but for my money there is still no better journalistic presentation of the Habeas issue than the segment of This American Life called Habeas Schmabeas. It won a Peabody Award in 2006, and has been updated for 2007.
(Illustration from Salon.com)
We actually need to look at what first happened when the U.S. captured the Taliban fighters in Afghanistan, remember that Bush did not classify the Taliban fighters as prisoners of war (POW) so right away he decided not to follow the Geneva Convention and its rules for the treatment of POWs. Remember the pictures of captured Taliban fighters with hoods over their heads as they were flown into Guantanamo? Terrorists are not allowed to see anything.
Since Bush and his cronies decided the Geneva Convention did not apply to the “terroristsâ€Â, “unlawful combatants†or whatever the scary name of the week was, they could interrogate, “gently†persuade the “terrorists†for information. Since they were not POWs, I’m sorry Mr. Terrorist no tribunal for you as guaranteed by the Geneva Convention.
And the saga continued with the Patriot Act, Military Commissions Act, and the Your Truly Screwed Act. In my opinion this all has to start with demonizing the enemy and scaring the holy hell out of you.
The scary term used by our most infamous of world leaders
1) “Twin evils of the world†by Adolph Hitler to describe Communism and Judaism. The Jews are evil and will conquer the world.
I forgot what we called the scary Chinese Communists, who now make almost everything in my house. I hope they aren’t poisoning me with lead paint or something else. A few of the scary terms I have personally been “scared†by and was not able to sleep many nights, I was also looking under my bed for these scary guys.
1) “Evil Empire†by Ronald Reagan to describe the Soviet Union.
2) “Axis of Evil†by George “Papa†Bush to describe Iran, Iraq, and North Korea
3) “Beyond the Axis of Evil” to descibe Libya, Syria and Cuba. (I really like this expression)
Now my conspiracy theory, why have Rumsfeld and Cheney been in so many Republican administrations going back to Nixon? Hmmmmm….
President Reagan called it right. What’s scary is to pretend that there’s no one trying to break into your house rather than confront him with a double barrel shotgun in his face.
The NY Times doesn’t care about “fair trials.” The New York Times doesn’t care about stopping terrorism. It just cares about hurting President Bush. LINK: FOR EXAMPLE
The 9/11 terrorists qualified as invaders in my book.
Woody,
That children’s book comment is pretty damn funny (even has pictures), I give you that, maybe funnier than the liberals at Starbucks comment.
By the way I have a cheap Remington single barrel pump shotgun under my bed. A single barrel pump shotgun is way better for greeting unwanted terrorists.
And I also have an antique side by side double barrel break action shotgun in the closet. The antique shotgun might blow up in my face and is too slow to reload.
Nice try Pokey. Trouble is the Court disagrees with you. See EX PARTE MCCARDLE for example. Yes Lincoln suspended Habeau citing the above but he went to Congress for approval. The Court said with that he acted illegally.
Nice try I’ll give you a B for effort.
56-43 Sent one senator an orchid, the other an onion.
Woody Says:
President Reagan called it right. What’s scary is to pretend that there’s no one trying to break into your house
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Oh I forgot to tell you I used to have dinner twice a week with some very scary Cubans from “Beyond the Axis of Evil” we would drink Cuba-Libres (rum, coke& lime) and discuss taking over the world or else football that is soccer to you.
And, I’ve had lunches with Cuban friends who escaped Castro and despise him to his dying day, whenever it will be officially announced. The world, Latin America, and Cuba would be better places if he had not been around. (Good job on that Bay of Pigs thing, JFK.)
Very good Woody you intelligently made the distinction of saying Castro, not the “Axis of Evil†Cuba which would serve to demonize all the citizens of Cuba. One dictator does not make every person in the country your enemy. I’ll bet some of those Cubans you met were nice hard working people just like you.
I am sure you remember during the previous Iraq war, we heard about the bad-ass million man Iraqi Army and its dying loyalty to Saddam Hussein. We also all remember the images of overweight older Iraqi soldiers without boots surrendering to young Marines and almost cheering their own capture. They were happy to jump into the back of U.S. Marine trucks and be treated to a MRI and a drink of water. We did not put hoods over their heads and ship them over to Guantánamo Bay and suspend their rights under the Geneva Convention.
Not every Taliban soldier captured in Afghanistan is some sub-human whose only desire is to destroy America. I am sure there are Islamic extremists that view all Americans as the “Axis of Evil†just as there are American Right Wing extremists in America who view all Muslims or Arabs (not just Islamic extremists) as the “Axis of Evilâ€Â. And there are some fools who can’t make the distinction between Islam, Muslim and an Arab person. Just like NOT every American soldier is a Right Wing extremist but a kid serving his country and looking for a job, there are Taliban soldiers serving their country (some by force and fear) others just to make a living. We need to always make the distinction between the government leaders and the foot soldiers. That is part of the reason we have created doctrines of just wars.
So we should not just demonize the whole country because of their leader, there are even American who think their leader is a fucking idiot. See if you can guess how many?
There was even a General in Iraq who was telling President Bush what the people really needed in Iraq was jobs and that would help stabilize the region. Not every problem is solved by killing or torturing soldiers operating under a stupid ass leader or dictator.