# "We're Losing the Last Shreds of Legal Rights to Protect Ourselves from Oligarchy" **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 7, 2014, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873 "2014-05-07T05:20:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/1 "2014-05-07T05:20:14Z")
Chris Hedges of Alternet, a liberal/progressive news site, [reports](http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/were-post-constitutional-era): > [@Chris Hedges](#): > > The U.S. Supreme Court decision to refuse to hear our case concerning Section 1021(b)(2) of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which permits the military to seize U.S. citizens and hold them indefinitely in military detention centers without due process, means that this provision will continue to be law. It means the nation has entered a post-constitutional era. It means that extraordinary rendition of U.S. citizens on U.S. soil by our government is legal. It means that the courts, like the legislative and executive branches of government, exclusively serve corporate power — one of the core definitions of fascism. He then goes on, in part (and this is the part I found interesting/provocative): > [@Chris Hedges](#): > > And it means that if we do not rapidly build militant mass movements to overthrow corporate tyranny, including breaking the back of the two-party duopoly that is the mask of corporate power, we will lose our liberty. This quite Tea Party-ish statement from a liberal struck me as interesting (though of course both sides have quite different reasons and reasonings for their brand of revolution. He then goes on to put the blame on the capitalist system, arguing that the rich and powerful have basically bought the government, and there’s nothing short of the previously mentioned “militant mass movement” that’ll break it. So what do you all think of the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the case? Is Hedges right? Does he have a chance in hell of creating the “militant mass movement” he thinks is necessary (personally, barring an abuse of power so public and egregious that it’s impossible to ignore, I don’t think so)? Even if he did, would it make any difference? ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/2 "2014-05-07T05:34:14Z")
Alternet is also quite heavily involved in conspiracy theories, so take what they say with a grain of salt. A massive grain of salt. The fact that there’s not really any possible “standing” to take against this law until you’ve been imprisoned and released is rather disturbing, but personally I’m kind of dubious that this will end in any sort of government takeover. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/3 "2014-05-07T05:38:41Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Alternet is also quite heavily involved in conspiracy theories, so take what they say with a grain of salt. A massive grain of salt. Aha, I thought the name of the site sounded familiar, but I only got primary links in the first couple of Google search pages, so I couldn’t confirm. But I think the thread is worthwhile anyway, to discuss actual legalities, whether the issue as it’s presented by them will get any traction (especially since I saw it being spread online, which may or may not mean anything), whether this represents any sort of mainstream in liberal/progressive thought (or if the Tea Party comparison is even more apt than I thought), etc. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/4 "2014-05-07T05:43:36Z")
Oh, don’t get me wrong, that passage of the NDAA is an absolute atrocity, and the way the supreme court handles cases needs some serious reworking (newsflash, guys - in many cases, especially the really nasty ones, we’re gonna want to be able to challenge the constitutionality of a law _before_ we get hit by its effects!), but I don’t see this as the kind of “end of democracy” schtick that people like Alex Jones or Chris Hedges make it out to be. ---
**Author:** ![crono35](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f6c823/32.png) [@crono35](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crono35)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/5 "2014-05-07T05:44:24Z")
Just because something is legal in the eyes of the government doesn’t necessarily mean it will be used as an everyday tool against the general population. I think you’ll be hard pressed to find any government which, at some point, never had to make compromises in the name of national security. The question is how far the government needs to go before revolution becomes reality. As for a “militant mass movement”, the only chance of that ever working is if the threat alone caused the US military to back down. If it ever came down to any sort of actual warfare, I doubt any sort of weaponry that civilians have access to would make much of a difference. The second amendment was created at a time when “you have a gun, we have a gun, this makes us equal” may have been a relatively true statement. Should we be physically oppressed in this day and age, a civilian militia wouldn’t really be able to do anything, regardless of how many red dawn remakes get made. Keep in mind i’m in favor of gun ownership- I just make no illusions on how effective an army of unfit, untrained, and under armed people would be. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/6 "2014-05-07T06:00:50Z")
Plus, and this really should be said, a revolution when the populace is well-fed and generally contented is about as likely as a thunderstorm without a cloud in the sky. It’s one thing to realize that the political situation is bad, and that people are getting lugged away; to understand that you’re less free than before and that things are likely going downhill. But how bad do things have to get, really, before you say to yourself “I am going to go out and fight and die for more freedom”? Think about that for a moment. When you decide to start a violent revolution against a corrupt government, you risk your life, your livelihood, sometimes your family. And if you have a job, if you have food, if you have a roof over your head… It takes a whole lot of dissatisfaction to go that far. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/7 "2014-05-07T06:35:17Z")
Pretty much zero chance of Hedges getting his militia - who exactly does he think is going to join him? Hedges should put his energy into repealing this law by normal legislative means. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/8 "2014-05-07T06:56:11Z")
I was interested to discover, relatively recently, that a lot of the laws and court cases governing the treatment of citizens in a military context date to the Civil War (which makes sense). > **[Habeas Corpus Suspension Act (1863)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_Corpus_Suspension_Act_1863)** > > The Habeas Corpus Suspension Act, 12 Stat. 755 (1863), entitled An Act relating to Habeas Corpus, and regulating Judicial Proceedings in Certain Cases, was an Act of Congress that authorized the president of the United States to suspend the right of habeas corpus in response to the American Civil War and provided for the release of political prisoners. It began in the House of Representatives as an indemnity bill, introduced on December 5, 1862, releasing the president and his subordinates from a... > **[Ex parte Merryman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_parte_Merryman)** > > Ex parte Merryman, 17 F. Cas. 144 (C.C.D. Md. 1861) (No. 9487), was a controversial U.S. federal court case that arose out of the American Civil War. It was a test of the authority of the President to suspend "the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus" under the Constitution's Suspension Clause, when Congress was in recess and therefore unavailable to do so itself. More generally, the case raised questions about the ability of the executive branch to decline enforcement of judicial decisio John ... > **[Ex parte Milligan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_parte_Milligan)** > > Ex parte Milligan, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 2 (1866), is a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that ruled that the use of military tribunals to try civilians when civil courts are operating is unconstitutional. In this particular case, the Court was unwilling to give President Abraham Lincoln's administration the power of military commission jurisdiction, part of the administration's controversial plan to deal with Union dissenters during the American Civil War. Justice David Davis, who delivere... So while it may be questionable whether terrorists are enemies of the state or criminals, the legal basis for handling citizens as enemies of the state in special ways may date back ~150 years and were never overturned. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/9 "2014-05-07T08:23:14Z")
Don’t know anything about Chris Hedges, but is it necesarily the case that when he calls for “miltitant mass movements”, he is necesarily calling for _violent_ mass movements? When used by right-wingers, “militant” often (usually?) does mean that, shooting people or threatening to do so being the only form of activism they understand or consider acceptable, but in centrist and left-wing discourse I don’t think it has that connotation. All kinds of protest and activism are embraced in a term like “militant”. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/10 "2014-05-07T10:55:06Z")
Heck, just being an atheist minding your own business can get you called “militant”. Thing is, as long as the politics of fear keep working in the U.S., I don’t see a lot of political impetus to say “Hey, we’ve really gone overboard on this anti-terrorist stuff.” Or at least, not a lot of political impetus to say it and mean it. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/11 "2014-05-07T11:44:26Z")
There won’t be a mass movement until people feel that they, personally, are being squished. The last major movement in the US was the Civil Rights movement, which only happened because large (large!) numbers of people were being treated unfairly, and had suffered it long enough, and stood up and said NO. No Supreme Court decision is going to roil people up, until/unless the govt actually starts doing more such. Most people are complacent and will not be moved until they personally are affected. BTW, it’s not the govt that worries me, it’s that the country is now owned by the large corporations who have no “constitution” and respect no rights except their own greed. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/12 "2014-05-07T11:55:13Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > … but personally I’m kind of dubious that this will end in any sort of government takeover. Ah, a government takeover of the country. We can’t have that. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/13 "2014-05-07T12:48:45Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Ah, a government takeover of the country. We can’t have that. :smack: Well, you know what I mean, right? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/14 "2014-05-07T13:16:08Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Oh, don’t get me wrong, that passage of the NDAA is an absolute atrocity, and the way the supreme court handles cases needs some serious reworking (newsflash, guys - in many cases, especially the really nasty ones, we’re gonna want to be able to challenge the constitutionality of a law _before_ we get hit by its effects!), but I don’t see this as the kind of “end of democracy” schtick that people like Alex Jones or Chris Hedges make it out to be. Standing is a requirement for Article III jurisdiction. How do you propose this gets changed? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/15 "2014-05-07T13:26:09Z")
This is a terrible law, and it’s not the way we do things. We have a long tradition in this country of waiting until the last minute to panic about a perceived threat and enact oppressive legislation or just use executive orders to deprive people of their rights without allowing an opportunity for judicial review. This pre-emptive action is likely to get overturned, very poor planning by the government in giving us a chance to overturn this legislation before it can be misapplied. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/16 "2014-05-07T13:38:44Z")
> [@crono35](#): > > As for a “militant mass movement”, the only chance of that ever working is if the threat alone caused the US military to back down. If it ever came down to any sort of actual warfare, I doubt any sort of weaponry that civilians have access to would make much of a difference. The second amendment was created at a time when “you have a gun, we have a gun, this makes us equal” may have been a relatively true statement. Should we be physically oppressed in this day and age, a civilian militia wouldn’t really be able to do anything, regardless of how many red dawn remakes get made. > > Keep in mind i’m in favor of gun ownership- I just make no illusions on how effective an army of unfit, untrained, and under armed people would be. By definition, government must maintain a “monopoly on violence” over the region and people it governs. That is to say, government must have enough power to enforce the law over some portion of the population who, for one reason or another, choose not to follow it. Not like I’m pro militia or anything, but people seem to think rebels would just face off against the 82nd Airborne Division gun for gun. That’s not the way an insurgency works anyone familiar with the insurgencies in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam should understand that. The Boston Marathon bombers shut down an entire city with just a couple of pressure cookers stuffed with gunpowder. On 9/11 terrorists caused millions of dollars of damage, thousands of deaths and changed the course of history with a few box-cutters. And look at the effects of the various school and mall shootings. The point is that it doesn’t take a lot of weapons to cause a great deal of havoc. Now the examples I give are criminals, but what if they were just ordinary people lashing out at a repressive government? And what if those people had lots of supporters who would provide them intelligence or sanctuary and were generally uncooperative with authorities? Or if there were elements of law enforcement or the military who also did not share in the oppressive policies of the government? ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/17 "2014-05-07T13:39:13Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Standing is a requirement for Article III jurisdiction. How do you propose this gets changed? I honestly don’t know that much about legal structures; it just strikes me as beyond bizarre that you can’t file something along the lines of a general purpose constitutional challenge - that is, if a law violates the constitution, you should be able to challenge it regardless of whether or not it has already affected you. In this case, the challenge would, to my understanding, have to come from those who were unjustly imprisoned to begin with. That’s… not good odds in terms of overturning the law. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/18 "2014-05-07T13:56:48Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Standing is a requirement for Article III jurisdiction. How do you propose this gets changed? SCOTUS has _interpreted_ Article III to require standing. There’s nothing about the cases and controversies clause that really requires the interpretation that it’s been given; it would seem that the abstract question of whether the detention provision of the NDAA is the very definition of a “controversy”. ---
**Author:** ![SirGalahad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/71c47a/32.png) [@SirGalahad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirGalahad)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/19 "2014-05-07T15:39:03Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > **Heck, just being an atheist minding your own business can get you called “militant”**. Thing is, as long as the politics of fear keep working in the U.S., I don’t see a lot of political impetus to say “Hey, we’ve really gone overboard on this anti-terrorist stuff.” Or at least, not a lot of political impetus to say it and mean it. Agreed. I submit you could get on plenty of government lists by just posting on a message board like this one. I’m uncomfortable with the inclination of most otherwise reasonable people, to “whistle past the graveyard” when it comes to the paranoid, authoritarian government, as though, if we pretend that it’s a benevolent structure, filled with ethical, hardworking members, it won’t show it’s teeth as the mouldering “Hydra” counterpart it appears to be, beneath a thin veneer. Why are the very people who should be wary of the State so quick to handwave this kind of insidiousness away, labeling it “conspiracy theory woo”? I mean, apart from the obvious government shills … I know why they do it. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873/20 "2014-05-07T15:50:15Z")
Well, like so many on the Left love to say, the Constitution is just a “slaveholders’ document” that’s long outdated itself. Be careful what you wish for, I guess. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-losing-the-last-shreds-of-legal-rights-to-protect-ourselves-from-oligarchy/687873.md?page=2)