US suspends Habeas Corpus for all noncitizens

[Rach3]

An incredible power has been given to the executive in recent hours, and many are celebrating.

WASHINGTON -- A last-minute change to a bill currently before Congress on the rights of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay could have sweeping implications inside the United States: It would strip green-card holders and other legal residents of the right to challenge their detention in court if they are accused of being ``enemy combatants."
...
But the part of the bill that worries advocates for immigrants most is the one stating that ``no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination."

``Habeas corpus" is the legal mechanism that gives people the right to ask federal courts to review their imprisonment.

In the original bill, the section banning ``habeas corpus" petitions applied only to detainees being held ``outside the United States," referring to the roughly 450 prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. But in recent days, the phrase ``outside the United States" was removed.

The White House did not respond to questions asking why the restriction was extended to people in the United States.

(Boston Globe)

Compare with the U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 9:

The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articlei.html#section9

Arlen Specter sponsored an amendment reinserting this right, which was struck down by demagogues:

The Senate rejected several amendments, including one supported by Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, that would have guaranteed detainees the right to go to civilian courts and assert their habeas corpus rights against unlimited detention without charges being placed against them.

Specter called it "unthinkable" that Congress would give up habeas corpus rights that go back 800 years, but Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) responded, "I don't believe judges should be making military decisions in a time of war." Specter's amendment lost 51-48.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0609290178sep29,1,1387725.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

 

[Rach3]

Further news articles:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/u...&en=4b0651b4401c1962&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Rather than reining in the formidable presidential powers Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have asserted since Sept. 11, 2001, the law gives some of those powers a solid statutory foundation. In effect it allows the president to identify enemies, imprison them indefinitely and interrogate them — albeit with a ban on the harshest treatment — beyond the reach of the full court reviews traditionally afforded criminal defendants and ordinary prisoners.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5390848.stm

Mr Bush had to compromise to get it past his own party but the guts of what he wanted are all there, says the BBC's Justin Webb.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-detain29sep29,1,2271064.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&ctrack=1&cset=true

But some lawmakers, Republicans as well as Democrats, called the move to suspend habeas corpus — the demand for legal justification of one's imprisonment — a historic mistake, and one that could cause the entire bill to be struck down.

"This is wrong; it is unconstitutional; it is un-American," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The judiciary panel's chairman, Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), said, "Surely as we are standing here, if this bill is passed and habeas corpus is stricken, we'll be back on this floor again" grappling with a future ruling against it by the Supreme Court.

 

[Rach3]

I'm idly wondering about the disturbing parallel in history when a severely exaggerated terrorist threat was used to justify suspending - all in one day - the rights of habeas corpus, as well as privacy of postal and telegraphic communications (~wiretapping) (as well as censorship of the press and political freedoms, which we aren't really seeing at all);

Articles 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124 and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. It is therefore permissible to restrict the rights of personal freedom [ habeas corpus ], freedom of opinion, including the freedom of the press, the freedom to organize and assemble, the privacy of postal, telegraphic and telephonic communications, and warrants for house searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.

Reichstag Fire Decree, 1933

It's of extreme fortune that the parallels are relatively shallow, and significant mechanisms still protect most consitutional rights (if not all). Or at the very least, that the rights of political opinion and organization still exist and are clearly in no danger - that alone is something even Hitler could not have surmounted.

 

[Astronuc]

"no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination."

The fact that such language is included in federal law, which is probably unconstitutional, is rather disturbing. On the other hand, the Constitution as originally written, did not grant, guarantee, or otherwise recognize the rights of women, Indians (indigenous people already living in the land to be claimed by the US government), slaves (then mostly Africans), and poor people (the majority of the population). It was up to those darn Liberals to see that everyone got the same rights. I guess they ruined a good thing, and George Bush and his cohorts, borrowing from Reichstag Fire Decree, 1933, will set things right.

 

[Futobingoro]

On the other hand, the Constitution as originally written, did not grant, guarantee, or otherwise recognize the rights of women, Indians (indigenous people already living in the land to be claimed by the US government), slaves (then mostly Africans), and poor people (the majority of the population). It was up to those darn Liberals to see that everyone got the same rights.

The federal Constitution (even as originally written) does not disenfranchise anybody. However, the constitutions of many of the various states did allow for disenfranchisement. Look closely at the Constitution. The procedure for selecting Representatives is a system in which the "people" choose. Those election procedures which did not involve a popular vote involved a selection by the state legislature (Senate, as originally written) or by electors (President).

The only mention of race or other similar considerations is made in the "3/5 compromise." But even this stipulation does not bar those "other persons" from voting, as the compromise determines only the number of the Representatives. The states were allowed to disenfranchise mainly by invoking the following clause from the federal Constitution:

The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof;

It can therefore be argued that the blame for disenfranchisement lies with the state governments, not with the federal Constitution. A study of the original New Jersey constitution is instructional in the independence state constitutions enjoyed from the federal one, and from those of other states.

I argue that the 15th and 19th Amendments are unnecessary. A similar legal standing for women, blacks and others could have been reached much earlier through a strict interpretation of the word "people" or "person" (where "strict" means that a "person" is a "person" and that adjectives such as "black, "female," or "poor" are only adjectives which describe that person).

Even if you are correct in your contention that the Liberals won equal rights through the years, it was only a correction of a very liberal mentality in which the definition of "person" could be construed to mean something entirely different; i.e. "white property-owning male."

No matter what political face the southern bigots wore, they were true die-hard loose-constructionists.

 

[Skyhunter]

Is this part of a mid-term strategy?

The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.

Does the congressional majority believe that we are in the midst of a Rebellion

It can't be an Invasion, we are fighting them over there, so we don't have to fight them here, right?

Seriously though when you combine this with the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. act, it gives more and more power to a more and more unpopular executive. One that has shown a tendency to fully utilize force and power to accomplish political objectives. (See Iraq war)