Martin, the man wasn’t a Syrian citizen- he was a citizen of Canada. What right does the US have to send aliens to a country other than their own?
I’m somewhat certain Arar was indeed a Syrian citizen as well as a Canadian one.
It is a legitimate question as to what right the United States has to deport someone to a country where they do not maintain a residence, but I’m not here to defend the actions involved with the Arar case but simply to point out that he wasn’t held arbitrarily, he was held until his deportation proceedings were completed and then he was deported. He was not being held “without cause” he was being held so that he could be deported. I’m not justifying the action itself but am just refuting its classification as an arrest and detainment without cause, there was a very specific cause.
So? I’m not going to argue about the wording of this law, it has been done before… The mere fact that “alien ennemy combattants” can be deprived from such rights shows that there’s no absolute constitutionnal protection against arbitrary arrests for aliens, since a mere statute can abolish this right for a given category.
You may state whatever you want about other countries arresting saboteurs in time of war or whatnot, such a law would be clearly unconstitutionnal in France, hence couldn’t be passed and/or implemented, the basis for such protections being the 1789 declaration of man and citizen rights, that, in its relevant articles use “man” or “no one” instead of “citizen” or “no citizen” : ("no man can be accused, arrested, or detained ", “no one can be punished”, “every man being presumed innocent”, etc…). To detain an ennemy saboteur, you’d need to follow the same procedure than for a domestic traitor (on the other hand, since there’s no universal constitutionnal right to reside in France, a law could be passed allowing the deportation of aliens for any reason whatsoever).
There’s no “saboteur” “combatant” “alien” “look suspicious” exceptions to a fundamental right. There’s no law that can trump a constitutionnal principle. Ergo, if such law exists and stands in the USA, it means there’s no universal constitutionnal right to due process of law. It’s a mere citizen’s priviledge, like the right of residence. If “enemy combatants” can be deprived today of the right to a due process of law “illegal immigrants” or “rude tourists” could be too tomorrow.
(As an aside, how do you tell one is/isn’t an “ennemy” a “saboteur”, an “alien” without due process of law? Without say due process, you can become an alien ennemy saboteur yourself in an heartbeat just because someone stated so).
Not to belabor this one case, but if indeed he had multiple citizenships, wouldn’t they have to go by the country on his passport?
Speaking as an American who surrenders about 40% of his income in combined federal, state, and local taxes, I can assure you we have no right to"grasp every cent we earn", no matter how tight our fists might be.
So, if we’re both accused of being saboteurs, me a french citizen and you an american citizen, the exact same rules would apply? You mean that you too could be arbitrarily detained?
Or maybe you mean that sabotage is only a crime for aliens, and that american citizens are free to engage in it, in the same way they have a right to reside in the USA that aliens don’t have, as in your example?
Or maybe that this statute about “ennemy combatants” has been laughed out of US courts because it was unconstitutionnal?
Or that the US constitution allows for a suspension of the right to due process of law when the legislator sees it fit, in other words that tomorrow, a law could be passed stating that “american shoplifters” could be dealt with in the same way “alien ennemy combatants” can be today?
Because if it’s none of the above, then, american citizens have a constitutionnal rigt to a due process of law that aliens don’t have.
I see on preview that a poster stated that the right to due process of law can be suspended too for american citizens on the executive’s whim. Maybe it’s true, but then it’s hardly better.
The US Constitution is excellent in theory-howevewr, we have STATE COURTS/judges, who regularly trample on the constitution: in MA, we have divorce judges who regularly abridge the rights of plaintiffs. We laso have fedral judges who openly violate the Bill of Rights, and also abridge the rights of criminal defencdents.
So, yes, the Constitution is great-untill you have p[ower mad judges scrwing with it!
I see. So you’re informing me that the thousands of persons that the French military captured in the Battle of Verdun, on French soil, were not held in PoW camps? Were they given trials? Or were they held without habeas corpus rights, just curious.
So you’re saying the hundreds of thousands of German soldiers that were captured in battles in France during WWI were not held without trial or legal review?
Obviously, it is impossible for such a thing to happen in France, so you are claiming that hundreds of thousands of Germans were either 1) not held as PoWs or 2) if they were, they received the same legal protections that a French citizen would.
No, they obviously wouldn’t have to, I’d say it’s probably normal procedure to do just that. Like I said I’m not defending the Arar action as a whole I’m just refuting its mischaracterization.
I’m not sure I agree with that. This could be argued when considering for instance public healthcare, because indeed people would tend to view this as a right over here, but I don’t think it applies to the topic at hand.
In the case of hate speech laws and such, I believe it has more to do with individual rights. I don’t think it’s related to a risk of destabilization because otherwise bans on say, royalism, anachism, communism or whatnot would have been implemented too at one point or another in some country or another, and on the other hand hate speech, or negationnism wouldn’t be banned because it doesn’t usually bring a risk of destabilization. Actually, amongst the many laws that have been mentionned in this thread, your argument would apply only to the ban of nazi parties. And though I believe that this ban is a special case, I think it’s more related to the trauma nazism caused than to the very small risk of nazis destabilizing european countries nowadays.
I believe it’s about the individual right to not being harmed, and some form of speech being deemed sufficiently harmful (including indirectly, as is the case of “incitment to racial hatred”, “apology of war crimes”) to mandate a legal sanction.
Something I’m curious about is how it is possible that French authorities held 200,000 German POWs after WWII for use as forced labor, and petitioned Eisenhower for another 1.4m for said purpose.
I’m aware of course that the French seem to change governments fairly often, but if the basis of rights in France is based on the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, which was drafted in 1789, then it is hard to explain how hundreds of thousands of persons were detained and held as forced labor. I’m not aware of any criminal proceedings or judicial overview of these actions whatsoever.
Something I think that Clairobscur left out in quoting the declaration is it says no one can be arrested or imprisoned except according to the forms proscribed by law. Obviously at times, to use WWII era as an example since such a time period was used in Clairobscur’s example of detainments in the United States, French law has allowed the holding of hundreds of thousands of persons who had committed no crime for the use of them as forced labor.
There’s no “combatant exception” under French law, so I’m not sure how anyone was held as a POW by French authorities during WWI or after WWII.
From this quote:
If there is no law that can trump a constitutional principle then explain the hundreds of thousands of Germans held as POWs and used as forced labor by France after WWII? If we’re going to talk about America’s actions in WWII it is only fair to talk about France’s. Such actions should have been impossible, because no law can trump a constitutional principle.
I’m sure they could have had one in the odd case where they would have disputed being german soldiers at the first place.
I think you’re mixing up everything. The status of war prisonners doesn’t have much to do with penal law. Actually, PoW are granted special protections other individuals don’t benefit from. The “ennemy combatant” in this case is granted priviledges, he’s not losing rights. For instance, they aren’t prosecuted for murder if captured after a battle. A random german (or frenchman, for that matter) not wearing an uniform would have been.
You’re talking about something else entirely. You’re talking about depriving someone of the right to due process of law on the basis of its citizenship (if it were not the case we would not be talking about ** alien ** ennemy combatants, would we? ) and at the same time somehow denying that it is what happens.
I’m not denying that saboteurs, spies, etc… are being prosecuted, detained, etc…everywhere (though in this case the word “combatants” would certainly require a clear definition). I’m saying that when they’re, it’s normally following the same procedure than for any other crimes, with the same right to a due process of law. And also that it applies equally to citizens and aliens. If we are both supected of planting a “dirty bomb” in an a US city, you won’t get a free pass. There will be an enquiry about you too, maybe you’ll be prosecuted, etc… But I won’t get the same legal guarantees, recourses, etc… you will have. I can be detained without recourse on mere suspicions, and you can’t.
Once again, if indeed every man has a right to a due process of law in the USA, regardless of his citizenship, please show me the numerous legal opinions, cases, etc…showing that everybody agrees that this law is deemed unconstitutionnal.
Or more simply, how can you tell that I have a constitutionnal right to a due process of law in the USA when a mere statute can deprive me of it? Once again, either I have this right, and this statute is a mere piece of paper that won’t stand in court, or I don’t.
Sure. But the difference is that the “War on Terrorism” isn’t really a “war” in any meaningful sense. As Bush himself apparently said, it will never really be over. So does this mean that it will be acceptable to suspend rights and freedoms, forever?
Okay, maybe so. But this is true when the US is fighting a war that is threatening American soil. Is it currently the case? As I said, terrorism as a military tactic is very different from traditional tactics. Sure, there could be other terrorist attacks on the US. But does this require the government having wartime powers to deal with it, and using military tactics?
I don’t consider the war in Iraq here, since even though it may have the effect of increasing the terroristic threat, I don’t count it as a “war” in the sense of a war that threatens the US’s integrity.
We’ll see. Other than what I’ve read on this board, I’m not really familiar with the increased powers currently held by the executive. But as we can see, there are intense debates about how appropriate these powers are in the first place.
I’m using Windows XP. For some reason, it keeps rebooting without warning. I know that I’m one of the few with this problem, since almost everyone says how amazingly stable Windows XP is. (I didn’t have as many stability problems with my laptop with Windows 98 on it.) I’m planning on reinstalling Windows in the next few weeks; it might help but I kind of doubt it.
It might be a hardware issue. WinXP is set to reboot automatically whenever it bluescreens - meaning you might have bad memory, powersupply, flaky spot on your harddrive or a corrupt winxp install thats creating the issue. So if the reinstall doesn’t work, it’s probably time for a new laptop.
[/hijack]
I guess you’re right. There are no laws against Holocaust denial in my country (although there are hate speech laws), so I wasn’t quite sure what the reason for them was. Actually, I’m not sure I would approve of such laws if there was an attempt to introduce them in Canada, but of course our situation is different from European countries’.
I do believe, though, that the United States is notable in the supreme importance it gives to individual rights and freedoms, while other societies, while recognizing the importance of these rights, also value some collective rights. Since you’re French, maybe I should mention the well-known importance of secularism in France. I thought it was an unacceptable attack on individual freedoms to forbid the wearing of religious symbols in French public schools. I’m still against this law, but I can understand the argument that secularism is a vital value to French society, while wearing religious symbols may lead to sectarianism and prevent the integration of some people into the general society. I don’t necessarily agree with that argument, but I’m not French and my values differ.
Ah, the “slippery slope” argument. Americans are fond of this argument to explain why, in their mind, any attack on individual freedoms is wrong. I don’t agree with this argument because I think that for different societies, the slippery slope starts at different points. I’m sure that, as an American, you would agree with Pjen’s quotes saying that you cannot be allowed to shout “fire” in a crowded theatre (notwithstanding Zoe’s argument that theatres are actually private businesses and not subject to freedom of speech). But then I could say, if you think people shouldn’t be allowed to express harmful speech, what tells me that tomorrow they’ll still be able to express speech that is harmless but demonstrably false? And the day after tomorrow, speech that you merely disagree with? You’d be right to answer that this is absurd.
For an American, branding some speech as unacceptable is itself unacceptable, since it raises the possibility that tomorrow, other speech will be seen as unacceptable. For people in other societies, maybe this kind of speech is seen as so unacceptable that they consider it as different in nature from other speech. So the suggestion that there is a slippery slope here would be absurd to them.
No one’s talking about regulating thoughts. We’ve been mostly discussing tolerable and intolerable speech.
Well, first, I retract my claim that laws against Holocaust denial are intended to ensure stability, since clairobscur’s explanation is probably more likely. Actually, I think both effects are possible. Having an idea out in the open may lead to people taking it more seriously, and it may lead to people criticizing it more. In countries where neo-Nazi parties are active, having Holocaust denial be legal might have the effect of making them more mainstream. But I don’t have any proof of this, and clairobscur does say that neo-Nazis are unlikely to destabilize Europe. So I won’t claim anything.
And I would agree that Europeans give a greater importance to their government than Americans do. (I wouldn’t use the term “paternalistic”, though.) Americans’ attitudes towards the government are somewhat of a mystery to me, sometimes they seem to want as little of it as possible in their lives, while at other times they seem willing to give the government carte blanche to do what it wants in order to protect them; but in general they seem more wary towards the government than Europeans and they give a greater importance to the private sector. But I don’t think either Americans and Europeans are “better” in this regard, they just have different values.
My WinXP box is a desktop, not a laptop. (I was using my Win98 laptop as my primary computer before I bought this one.) I’ll try reinstalling; if it doesn’t work, too bad, what I usually do is I save my messages in a text file while I’m writing them. (Actually, it would be nice if there was some sort of auto-save function, like in Gmail, but I guess it would have to be added to the vBulletin software. Maybe I should start a thread in ATMB about this.)
So unless they could prove they weren’t German soldiers, they couldn’t be released? What was their crime that justified holding them in camps and making them engage in forced labor?
I very seriously doubt the Germans considered themselves to be the recipients of special treatment since they suffered a higher death rate at the hands of French captors than they did of any other Allies other than the Soviets.
Not true, PoWs do lose rights, they lose the right to liberty, it is taken away without any judicial recourse.
No, I’m not. Persons tries by military commissions still receive due process, just from a different authority than normal criminals.
Both France and the United States have a history of trying war criminals under special tribunals. The fact that enemy combatants receive a different form of due process doesn’t suggest that the U.S. system doesn’t give protection of the law to aliens. Like I said, it does not give the entirely same protection, nor does the legal system of any country. For example in the United States, there is not any right to be here if you are not a citizen and aliens can theoretically be deported at any time for any reason (that’s constitutionally speaking, there are legislative restrictions to summary deportation in many cases.) A citizen obviously cannot be deported summarily or deported at all.
One French citizen you may have heard of is Zacarias Moussaoui who was tried just as any criminal would be in U.S. District Court.
He did not receive the same legal protections as Yaser Hamdi did, who is an American citizen. He received far more legal protections than Hamdi, because Hamdi was a captured enemy combatant.
There’s no real reason to get in to specific court cases because, just like your Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen our Bill of Rights makes no reference to citizenship status whatsoever.
A mere statute can deprive Americans of the writ of habeas corpus, too. During times of insurrection or invasion the government has the specific, constitutionally stated power to suspend the writ. We can argue about whether a government should ever have such a power, but as this thread as shown different societies have different feelings when it comes to rights and how they should be implemented, and I don’t believe that makes any one country “better” than another. FWIW the provision on suspension of the writ has not been used to my knowledge since the Civil War, and it was only intended to be used in times of active insurrection or invasion, which is a very serious situation where I think the government has to have a broad array of powers it would not have normally for the sake of society as a whole.
Respect for the right to express contrary opinions? Hardly any. And I think the fear-mongering by our current right-wing political establishment is eroding what little respect remains for the right to to state that there is a lot of room for improvement in the way the US reacted and is reacting, to the 9/11 attacks.
Can you give further examples of ‘collective rights’? I’m curious to see if there exists one that doesn’t trample on individual rights. I’m having a hard time thinking of some good examples that would actually outweigh curtailing individual freedom. From my perspective, individual rights are at the top of the list as far as being untouchable. The individual is what the government is created to protect and represent. As soon as you start granting preference to collectives and organizations, you empower them to limit the rights of individuals, especially those in the minority, which I contend is a bad thing. Protecting the minority from oppressive legislation by the majority is an important function of a representative government.
How about this: yelling ‘fire’ in a crowded theater is a limit on a collective right. The speech is directed at inciting a mob, its not reflective of their personal ideas or views. Expressing views and showing support for ideas (speech and expression), while sometimes controversial, are not incendiary. You’ll notice that when ‘certain speech’ becomes a problem, it always involves groups of people - not an individual. So really we are limiting the ‘speech’ of a collective or group.
Yes, but the limitations seem designed to stamp out a certain ideal. Which would translate into the regulation of thought - It can’t be discussed, promoted or criticized if it is unlawful to talk about it period. And that is harmful to educating.
Just by analyzing the histories of the nations, I think you’ll see a big part of why certain nations are leery of government and why some are more supportive of them.
Getting back to the original post - it would seem the statement “Few countries would have the balls…” is proving true - it would appear (atleast after reading this thread) that most nations who have restrictions on speech do so out of the fear of what would happen if the citizenry did have those full rights. Now whether or not its ‘balls’ as the OP stated (fear as far as I’m concerned), or a thorough understanding of human nature, as I’m sure the non-US will contend is what it comes down to.