Relentless Inquiry

Um. Time to write letters, big ones, to your reps.

Seriously. Faxed, original letters (email is counted less). Identify yourself as residing in the district (if you are) prominently in the beginning, that counts extra.

Will look up and post the HR/S numbers of the legislation shortly.

——– Original Message ——–
Subject: [IP] Yes, it CAN happen here. (Happening right now, in fact)
Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2006 14:29:44 -0400
From: David Farber
…
Subject: Yes, it CAN happen here. (Happening right now, in fact)

http://htdaw.blogsource.com/post.mhtml?post_id=387160

Thursday, September 28, 2006 at 2:19 PM EDT
“BURIED IN THE complex Senate compromise on detainee treatment is a
real shocker, reaching far beyond the legal struggles about foreign
terrorist suspects in the Guantanamo Bay fortress. The compromise
legislation, which is racing toward the White House, authorizes the
president to seize American citizens as enemy combatants, even if
they have never left the United States. And once thrown into military
prison, they cannot expect a trial by their peers or any other of the
normal protections of the Bill of Rights”
…
This dangerous compromise not only authorizes the president to seize
and hold terrorists who have fought against our troops “during an
armed conflict,” it also allows him to seize anybody who has
“purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United
States.” This grants the president enormous power over citizens and
legal residents. They can be designated as enemy combatants if they
have contributed money to a Middle Eastern charity, and they can be
held indefinitely in a military prison.

Not to worry, say the bill's defenders. The president can't detain
somebody who has given money innocently, just those who contributed
to terrorists on purpose.

But other provisions of the bill call even this limitation into
question. What is worse, if the federal courts support the
president's initial detention decision, ordinary Americans would be
required to defend themselves before a military tribunal without the
constitutional guarantees provided in criminal trials.

Legal residents who aren't citizens are treated even more harshly.
The bill entirely cuts off their access to federal habeas corpus,
leaving them at the mercy of the president's suspicions.

We are not dealing with hypothetical abuses. The president has
already subjected a citizen to military confinement. Consider the
case of Jose Padilla. A few months after 9/11, he was seized by the
Bush administration as an “enemy combatant” upon his arrival at
Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. He was wearing civilian
clothes and had no weapons. Despite his American citizenship, he was
held for more than three years in a military brig, without any chance
to challenge his detention before a military or civilian tribunal.
After a federal appellate court upheld the president's extraordinary
action, the Supreme Court refused to hear the case, handing the
administration's lawyers a terrible precedent.

The new bill, if passed, would further entrench presidential power.
At the very least, it would encourage the Supreme Court to draw an
invidious distinction between citizens and legal residents. There are
tens of millions of legal immigrants living among us, and the bill
encourages the justices to uphold mass detentions without the
semblance of judicial review.

But the bill also reinforces the presidential claims, made in the
Padilla case, that the commander in chief has the right to designate
a U.S. citizen on American soil as an enemy combatant and subject him
to military justice. Congress is poised to authorized this
presidential overreaching. Under existing constitutional doctrine,
this show of explicit congressional support would be a key factor
that the Supreme Court would consider in assessing the limits of
presidential authority.

This is no time to play politics with our fundamental freedoms. Even
without this massive congressional expansion of the class of enemy
combatants, it is by no means clear that the present Supreme Court
will protect the Bill of Rights. The Korematsu case — upholding the
military detention of tens of thousands of Japanese Americans during
World War II — has never been explicitly overruled. It will be tough
for the high court to condemn this notorious decision, especially if
passions are inflamed by another terrorist incident. But
congressional support of presidential power will make it much easier
to extend the Korematsu decision to future mass seizures.
…
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe-
ackerman28sep28,1,138419,print.story

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