Cite?
:rolleyes: Define “terrorist”, then show me one and prove it. I’m embarassed that people think this way.
Are you kidding? That itself is a civil right that they’ve already gotten.
In fact that’s what the whole Military Commissions Act was designed to do, to establish a system for the U.S. military to handle persons captured who are not POWs in a manner consistent with our obligations under the Geneva Convention and in the interests of fairness.
Exactly what rights terrorists or unlawful or illegitimate combatants have in contrast to POWs is fairly clear.
A POW cannot be charged with a crime simply for his legitimate military actions. The United States for example, capturing a German soldier in Normandy who had that very day killed 20 American soldiers could not later try and convict this man of twenty counts of murder and subsequently execute him. What they can do is hold him as a prisoner of war until such time as hostilities cease, because that is viewed as militarily necessary. You’ve come into custody of a person who poses a threat to the United States as an enemy soldier, but because they are a legitimate enemy soldier you have the responsibility to hold them as a POW. Specific treatment of POWs is spelled out, they are in general not to be interrogated and etc, and are supposed to be provided certain amenities that are typically far and above that which your average prison inmate is entitled to in a civilian penal system.
Unlawful combatants have always been a different matter. You most certainly have the right to hold them, but they are also subject to trial and punishment as they have committed crimes.
Unlawful combatants have always been a murkier area in both U.S. law and international law. During WWII we executed German saboteurs captured on U.S. soil. They were tried and sentenced to death by a military tribunal established on the executive order of FDR. At first, Bush tried to set up similar military tribunals for our captured unlawful combatants. However, the SCOTUS said that FDR’s tribunals were legitimate because legislation existed providing for it, specifically declarations and articles of war. But since we were not in a state of declared war, Bush’s tribunals were unconstitutionally until Congress enacted legislation allowing them. That is what was done in the Military Commissions Act.
The issue of habeas corpus is a somewhat different matter. I’ve never seen any precedent for POWs having right to the writ, and Johnson v. Eisentrager specifically says that aliens held in U.S.-administered detention centers outside of the United States do not have access to the U.S. court system.
Two prominent cases we’ve had recently, Padilla and Hamdi, did not involve aliens held outside the United States. It involved U.S. citizens that the President labelled enemy combatants and claimed could be held militarily. Padilla’s case was dismissed because his lawyer had improperly filed, on the same day Hamdi’s case was ruled on and the SCOTUS found that if the President names a U.S. citizen an enemy combatant that person has the right to appeal his classification through the U.S. judicial system.
In any case, all types of persons mentioned: POWs, alien unlawful combatants, and citizen unlawful combatants do have some rights. I’m not sure if POWs and alien unlawful combatants necessarily have civil rights if held outside the U.S., but they definitely have “human rights” that we are treaty-bound to give them. A citizen unlawful combatant certainly has some civil rights as a citizen, and so too would an alien unlawful combatant being tried. Any sort of trials we set up have to be appealable.
That’s a good post. The point where the real difference comes in, aside from the overheated rhetoric, is “appealable to whom?” I hold that in order to fight the capriciousness of a too-independent President, there must be a right for even convicted “nonlawful combatants,” let alone those merely suspected, to appeal to a judicial authority not in the President’s chain of command.
Judiciary should be separate from Executive, & when we charge someone with working with al Qaeda, we are making a very serious criminal charge. The seriousness demands not that we be more lax in following the rule of law, but more serious about proving that charge, so that even doubters in other countries may understand the legitimacy of the conviction.
[…and back to the at least slightly heated rhetoric]
I fear that Bush is subtly playing to those who would equate indictment with conviction, or whom dream of fascism in America, by creating a system where in theory, there could be (wink, nudge) torture & summary judgment going on, while insisting that it shouldn’t & won’t. Apparently, this sells. But it isn’t right. And if functionally, by using a layer of secrecy, his system allows torture of the unconvicted &/or kangaroo courts, why should we believe that it isn’t going on?
There have already been two detainees who died due to poor treatment. I don’t think they were so much intentionally tortured to death as sort of accidentally tortured to death due to poor training of the soldiers detaining them. This does not give me any confidence that Bush’s promises of humane treatment have any reality.
Decisions of Military Commissions may be appealed to the Court of Military Commission Review, then to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and from there to the United States Supreme Court.
No, it didn’t.
The Slashdot article was referring to one particular section, which some Chicken Little seemed to interpert as being the end of western civilization, etc. because it happened on Bush’s watch. Actually, all it did was allow the use of troops in a national emergency. Here’s the relevant text:
Full bill text: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h109-5122
Right. And what Slashdot also fails to mention is that there is another provision of law were unaffected by this change, so they are still on the books, and affords nearly exactly the same authority.
I didn’t write the GC, but it’s designed to codify the “rules of war”. This means that soldiers have an ID card, a recognizeable rank structure and uniforms, carry weapons openly, etc. Do you accept that?
This is more than a bit pessimistic. Abraham Lincoln, generally recognized as one of our greatest Presidents, suspended habeas corpus for the entire duration of the Civil War. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, also recognized as one of our greatest Presidents, interned the Japanese during World War II. In both cases it was later recognized that such actions were illegal, but at the time they were not seen as egregious offenses.
The point of this, of course, is that the pendulum swings both ways, and always passes through the center. The powers of the President will eventually be truncated and Congress will once more be the dominant force, and then a popular President will try to get something through Congress and the power will swing back. That is the nature of our system, particularly during times of war. Our system is self-correcting, particularly because of Presidential term limits. The new President will have to establish his powers, and as he does so Congress will grab some of it back.
You apparently didn’t read it either. I’ve already addressed this issue and you have failed to respond to it except to change the subject.
Just because you’ve “addressed” it doesn’t mean you are correct, sorry guy. I believe you suggested that non-signators of the GC should be afforded POW status, or something equally silly.
No.
Whatever gave you that idea? I see something similar coming up a lot and I’ve never seen where it comes from. Presumably something native to the US as no-one else ever mentions it.
For sure, it does not come from the GC, although one of several parts about who gets POW status does make mention in similar terms
You do not seem to have read what John Mace stated and you certainly have not read the various Geneva Conventions.
The point, which he did make, correctly, is that signers of the Geneva Conventions commit themselves to certain actions. Those actions include instructions for dealing with soldiers in uniform and also set out procedures for dealing with persons not in uniform. Regardless whether our foes follow the GC, we are committed to act in accordance with the procedures in any convention to which we have agreed, including those provisions that direct our actions regarding persons who are not soldiers.
There are, of course, gray areas that are being hammered out in our courts–some correctly, some, perhaps, less so–but the U.S. must, if it is a civilized nation that desires to be treated as such by other countries, follow all the provisions of the GC, regardless of the actions of our opponents.
You’re aware that even non-signatories are afforded protection by the GC, are you not?
Anyway, is there any country today that hasn’t signed on? I seem to recall a news report to the effect that everyone signed the thing finally.
The terrorist hate us for our freedoms so the proper course is…
It could be argued that the American Civil War was a somewhat greater threat to the existence, even the very concept,\ of the United States Government than, say, Osama bin Laden.
Although it sounds inane, I think that’s actually relevant – people who see doom in Dubya’s instinct to suspend habeas corpus simply can’t imagine that such a response is appropriate to the threat level, so they assign darker motives to the administration.
Sailboat