Support AlterNet
Do you value the information you're getting from AlterNet? Please show your support with a tax-deductible donation.
Feedback
Tell us how we're doing.
Putting the President in His Place
Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace:
Why McCain and the GOP Are So Afraid of Discussing the Economy
Frances Moore Lappe
Democracy and Elections:
Seven Ways Your Vote Might Not Count This November
Steven Rosenfeld
DrugReporter:
Obama's Biden Pick Signals 'More of the Same' Stupid Drug Policies
Paul Armentano
Election 2008:
McCain's Palin Gambit: Are Americans Weary of the Culture Wars?
Sanho Tree
Environment:
Boatloads of Trouble: How We Are Importing Our Way to Destruction
Stan Cox
ForeignPolicy:
The Bush Administration Checkmated in Georgia
Michael T. Klare
Health and Wellness:
Hospitals' Lessons From Hurricane Gustav
Sheri Fink
Hurricane Katrina:
From the Bayou to Baghdad: Mission Not Accomplished
Amy Goodman
Immigration:
Leader of Anti-Immigration Movement Calls Issue a "Skirmish in a Wider War"
Eric Ward
Media and Technology:
Only in America Could a Two-Faced Creature Like McCain Attain Such Media Status
Rory O'Connor
Movie Mix:
Does "Working Girls" Still Work?
Ariel Dougherty
Reproductive Justice and Gender:
Five Women Buried Alive -- and the Media Ignore It
Riane Eisler
Rights and Liberties:
On Top of Jail Time, Prisoners Now Face Fees and Surcharges
Emily Jane Goodman
Sex and Relationships:
What Republicans Can Learn from "Gossip Girl"
Sarah Seltzer
War on Iraq:
One Fifth of Iraq Funding Goes to Private Contractors
Willam Fisher
Water:
Is California on the Brink of Environmental Collapse?
Rachel Olivieri
We have long since made clear that a state of war is not a blank check for the president when it comes to the rights of the Nation's citizens. – Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the Supreme Court in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, June 28
Since 9-11, the president and other leading figures in his administration have piously pledged that whatever they do to make us secure from homicidal jihadists is, and will be, within the bounds of the Constitution.
The actual mind-set of the Bush team, however, was disclosed by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld (Newsday, September 15, 2002): "Anything that comes up in the United States tends to be looked at as a law enforcement matter . . . 'decide whether or not he's guilty or innocent and give him due process.'
"Of course," Rumsfeld continued, "if . . . you've got the risk of terrorists . . . killing thousands or tens of thousands of people, you're not terribly interested in whether or not the person is potentially a subject for law enforcement."
And even when arguing before the Supreme Court on April 28, 2004, Deputy Solicitor General Paul Clement told the justices, "Where the government is on a war footing, you have to trust the executive."
On June 28, ruling on American citizen Yaser Hamdi, held without charges for two years, incommunicado, in a navy brig in South Carolina as "an enemy combatant" – put away solely by the president – the Supreme Court vigorously instructed George W. Bush:
"We reaffirm today the fundamental nature of a citizen's right to be free from involuntary confinement by his own government without due process of law."
No president, said the Court, is above the Constitution, and while George W. Bush is commander in chief of the armed forces, he is not commander in chief of the rest of us.
The decision that Hamdi has the right to appear personally before a court or some other "neutral decision maker" and rebut the government's evidence against him was 8-to-1. Only Clarence Thomas is still willing to trust the government.
Antonin Scalia, in a scholarly partial dissent, said the majority had not gone far enough. Either charge Hamdi with treason, he said, or get Congress to suspend the writ of habeas corpus (the fundamental right of any imprisoned citizen to go to a court and have the government prove the lawfulness of his or her incarceration). Otherwise, Scalia said to the Bush teams, release Hamdi.
Since Antonin Scalia is not a card-carrying member of the American Civil Liberties Union, his rejection of the president's assertion of unfettered executive powers in the war on terrorism is particularly resounding. He wrote:
"Many think it is not only inevitable but entirely proper that liberty give way to security in times of national crisis. . . . Whatever the general merits of the view that war silences law or modulates its voice, that view has no place in the interpretation and application of a Constitution designed precisely to confront war and, in a manner that accords with democratic principles, to accommodate it." (Emphasis added.)
Hentoff writes for Village Voice.
Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from AlterNet! Sign up now »
| More News and Analysis: | ||
|
Five Women Buried Alive -- and the Media Ignore It Reproductive Justice and Gender: Why is it that we get so outraged over war but look the other way when women and girls are beaten and murdered in the name of tradition? By Riane Eisler, AlterNet. September 6, 2008. |
On Top of Jail Time, Prisoners Now Face Fees and Surcharges Rights and Liberties: Prisoners across the country are facing court fees, arrest fees and booking fees in addition to their sentences -- and states are raking in the cash. By Emily Jane Goodman, The Nation. September 6, 2008. |
One Fifth of Iraq Funding Goes to Private Contractors War on Iraq: If spending continues at the current rate, the U.S. will have spent 100 billion dollars on military contractors in Iraq by the end of the year. By Willam Fisher, IPS News. September 6, 2008. |