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Supreme Court restores habeas to Gitmo, giving yet another setback to Bush
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| MisterOpus1 |
Bummer for those darn neocons. Guess it wasn't a good enough workaround the Hamdan decision afterall:
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In a stunning blow to the Bush Administration in its war-on-terrorism policies, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign nationals held at Guantanamo Bay have a right to pursue habeas challenges to their detention. The Court, dividing 5-4, ruled that Congress had not validly taken away habeas rights. If Congress wishes to suspend habeas, it must do so only as the Constitution allows — when the country faces rebellion or invasion.
The Court stressed that it was not ruling that the detainees are entitled to be released — that is, entitled to have writs issued to end their confinement. That issue, it said, is left to the District Court judges who will be hearing the challenges. The Court also said that “we do not address whether the President has authority to detain” individuals during the war on terrorism, and hold them at the U.S. Naval base in Cuba; that, too, it said, is to be considered first by the District judges.
In a second ruling on habeas, the Court decided unanimously that U.S. citizens held by U.S. military forces in Iraq have a right to file habeas cases, because it does extend to them, but it went on to rule that federal judges do not have any authority to bar the transfer of those individuals to Iraqi authorites to face prosecution or punishment for crimes committed in that country in violation of Iraqi laws.
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/court-...-habeas-rights/ |
There's a lot of quotes from both sides to post, but I'm short on time so post and comment away. I'll have some money quotes up later, but here's one that obviously sticks out from Justice Kennedy writing for the majority:
| quote: | | Our basic charter cannot be contracted away like this. The Constitution grants Congress and the President the power to acquire, dispose of, and govern territory, not the power to decide when and where its terms apply.... Abstaining from questions involving formal sovereignty and territorial governance is one thing. To hold the political branches have the power to switch the Constitution on or off at will is quite another. The former position reflects this Court’s recognition that certain matters requiring political judgments are best left to the political branches. The latter would permit a striking anomaly in our tripartite system of government, leading to a regime in which Congress and the President, not this Court, say "what the law is." |
Gosh, that darn Unitary Executive thingy just keeps getting shot down.
This also underlies the utmost critical importance of who wins the election. It's almost a certainty that at least one, if not two judges will retire in the next presidential term, so whoever wins will most likely take the majority decisions for at least the next decade, if not longer. |
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| jerZ07002 |
| quote: | Originally posted by MisterOpus1
Bummer for those darn neocons. Guess it wasn't a good enough workaround the Hamdan decision afterall:
There's a lot of quotes from both sides to post, but I'm short on time so post and comment away. I'll have some money quotes up later, but here's one that obviously sticks out from Justice Kennedy writing for the majority:
Gosh, that darn Unitary Executive thingy just keeps getting shot down.
This also underlies the utmost critical importance of who wins the election. It's almost a certainty that at least one, if not two judges will retire in the next presidential term, so whoever wins will most likely take the majority decisions for at least the next decade, if not longer. |
i assume that alito, roberts, scalia, and thomas were the dissenters. Very predictable. |
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| Clovis |
| quote: | Originally posted by jerZ07002
i assume that alito, roberts, scalia, and thomas were the dissenters. Very predictable. |
Which is why it is absolutely CRUCIAL that John McCain not win this election.
People do not realize what is at stake here...
Anyways, great ruling. |
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| Krypton |
| I feel sorry for CHRles and latinlover. Their world must be crumbling all around them...:haha: |
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| Zild |
| All I can say is YES! |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| quote: | Originally posted by Krypton
I feel sorry for CHRles and latinlover. Their world must be crumbling all around them...:haha: |
what about shaolin? he'll have to take habeas corpus off his whinge list :p |
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| Q5echo |
the Constitution and, more importantly, the AMERICAN people lost to radical Islam today.
So who has won? Not the detainees. The Court's analysis leaves them with only the prospect of further litigation to determine the content of their new habeas right, followed by further litigation to resolve their particular cases, followed by further litigation before the D. C. Circuit—where they could have started had they invoked the DTA procedure. Not Congress, whose attempt to "determine—through democratic means—how best" to balance the security of the American people with the detainees' liberty interests, has been unceremoniously brushed aside. Not the Great Writ, whose majesty is hardly enhanced by its extension to a jurisdictionally quirky outpost, with no tangible benefit to anyone. Not the rule of law, unless by that is meant the rule of lawyers, who will now arguably have a greater role than military and intelligence officials in shaping policy for alien enemy combatants. And certainly not the American people, who today lose a bit more control over the conduct of this Nation's foreign policy to unelected, politically unaccountable judges.
Justice John Roberts
Today the Court warps our Constitution in a way that goes beyond the narrow issue of the reach of the Suspension Clause, invoking judicially brainstormed separation-of-powers principles to establish a manipulable “functional” test for the extraterritorial reach of habeas corpus (and, no doubt, for the extraterritorial reach of other Constitutional protections as well). It blatantly misdescribes [sic] important precedents, most conspicuously Justice Jackson’s opinion for the Court in Johnson v. Eisentrager. It breaks a chain of precedent as old as the common law that prohibits judicial inquiry into detentions of aliens abroad absent statutory authorization. And, most tragically, it sets our military commanders the impossible task of proving to a civilian court, under whatever standards this Court devises in the future, that evidence supports the confinement of each and every enemy prisoner.
The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today. I dissent.
Justice Antonin Scalia |
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| hardcore trancer |
so here are the final results:
Terrorists 1
USA 0
Must be a sad day for the Bush admin today.:( |
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| Q5echo |
| quote: | Originally posted by hardcore trancer
Must be a sad day for the Bush admin today.:( |
it is. but the dude abides |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| why shouldn't people be able to challenge their incarceration q5? :conf: |
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| Zild |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
why shouldn't people be able to challenge their incarceration q5? :conf: |
As much as it pains me I'm going to have to agree with you on this one. |
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| Q5echo |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
why shouldn't people be able to challenge their incarceration q5? :conf: |
because these particular people were caught on a battlefield in a time of war.
it's cold and callous hardly illegal and with precedence to boot, but thats as plainly as it can be put and you can draw your judgement from that. |
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