| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"" |
| Date: |
08 Oct 2004 09:43:29 PM |
| Object: |
Losing Liberty |
http://www.detnews.com/2003/editorial/0309/17/a10-273083.htm
Wednesday, September 17, 2003
President George W. Bush last week called for applying drug war police
rules to terrorism suspects, such as denying bail.
Losing Liberty: Due process
Congress and the Courts Must Protect Civil Liberties
Wartime power grabs by president must be curbed by other branches of
government
By The Detroit News
Americans have two avenues to check a president who tries to bend
the Constitution to his own advantage: Congress and the courts.
Both should be urged to counter President George W. Bush, who in
the name of fighting terrorism has not just over-stepped, but gutted
key legal safeguards intended to balance the rights of the individual
against the power of the government.
The Bush administration has usurped judicial powers by
establishing, though executive order, military tribunals to try
foreigners arrested on American soil -- effectively declaring himself
policeman, prosecutor and judge all in one. He has also, with the aid
of Congress, weakened due process protections by limiting judicial
oversight of search warrants. And he has obtained sweeping new powers
to spy on ordinary Americans through the Patriot Act.
Bush's actions are deplorable -- but not unprecedented. Nearly
every wartime president has attempted to grab additional powers to
meet their heavy responsibility for maintaining national security.
But it's the job of the courts and Congress to make sure civil
liberties aren't lost in the process.
The courts
Unfortunately, the judicial branch's record of balancing
presidential authority is spotty. Supreme Court Chief Justice William
Rehnquist acknowledges that courts, adhering to the adage, "in times
of war the laws are silent," have typically rubber-stamped executive
decisions.
For example, the Supreme Court during World War II upheld
President Franklin Roosevelt's decision to intern more than 100,000
Japanese Americans in concentration camps.
Judges share the same real-world concerns as everyone else and are
reluctant to limit presidential powers during a national crisis.
In addition, although a president has actively refused to obey a
court order only once -- when Abraham Lincoln continued to detain
Confederate sympathizers despite being ordered by the Supreme Court to
release them -- courts fear that a rejection of their authority by the
executive branch will erode their broader social standing. So they shy
away from open confrontation with the president.
But there are hints that the courts may be overcoming their
historic skittishness. Judges have been far more protective of civil
liberties in recent decades. At the very least, the courts are likely
to insist that any serious infringement of civil liberties now by the
president be backed by proper legislative action, some legal observers
maintain.
The first test will come when the courts rule on Padilla vs.
Rumsfeld, the so-called dirty-bomber case. The case filed on behalf of
Jose Padilla is now in a federal appeals court and challenges the
constitutionality of a Bush order to hold incommunicado a U.S. citizen
without a formal charge or court hearing.
The courts won't win any friends by affirming the constitutional
rights of someone accused of conspiring to detonate a radioactive
bomb. But doing so is necessary to send the Bush administration the
message that it can't unilaterally separate citizens from their
constitutional protections.
Congress
Congress' post-Sept. 11 conduct gives no indication that it takes
its constitutional oversight responsibilities seriously.
In fact, the unseemly haste with which Congress passed the Patriot
Act -- the 300-plus page wish list of powers sought by the Bush
administration -- offers an object lesson in how not to make laws in
times of emergency.
The law is full of problematic provisions. Some are already under
legal challenge. Lawmakers, meanwhile, are frantically trying to
repeal others, such as the "sneak and peek" measures that allow law
enforcement broad powers to intrude on the privacy of citizens.
Cleaning out the noxious measures in the Patriot Act is worth
doing. But lawmakers should also prevent such ill-conceived proposals
from being signed into law in the future.
For starters, they should ban Patriot-type laws that fold a lot of
disparate measures into one piece of legislation. Such bills vastly
increase the chances that bad proposals that would never have passed
on their own merits find their way into the federal books, notes Tim
Lynch of the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, D.C.
Next, the final vote on every crisis bill should be postponed to
ensure calm reflection and deliberation. Thomas Jefferson advocated a
one-year delay in a vote for every bill. But if a national emergency
requires speedier passage, Jefferson recommended that the law obtain
support from two-thirds of both houses instead of a bare majority.
Third, and most important, every new emergency bill that presents
any challenge to the civil liberties of Americans should come with a
sunset clause that prescribes when the law would lapse -- absent
further action by Congress.
This would not only prevent the executive from carrying out a
permanent power grab in the name of an emergency, it would also give
Congress a way of maintaining oversight.
The Constitution promises liberty to all, but it can't enforce or
defend itself. That's the responsibility of the three branches of
government. If one fails to do its job, the other two must step up.
--
Contempt of Congress meter reading-offscale.
Vote for Bush. Why vote for the lesser of two evils?
No matter the candidates the superstition industry wins.
'Jesus' is a sock-puppet Christians utilize to add 'authority' to
whatever action they intend on taking. -Stoney
.
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