The name of the case is Boumediene v. Bush, President of the United States. Decided the other day, the case is where a prisoner held at Guantanamo by the government was not brought to court or charged with a crime for six years. The government set up this prison in Cuba to avoid the federal courts in the U.S. We own a chunk of Cuba since the Spanish-American War of 1898 when we stripped Spain of its colonies, kept them for ourselves, and became a colonial power ourself. Mark Twain objected to our becoming an imperial power (which is what you are when you have colonies abroad) on the theory that it was un-American, which it is.
In our democracy, after all, we profess to believe that the only legitimate form of government is of the people, by the people, and for the people. Oh yes, and that all of the people are legally and morally equal to one another, meaning that some people under one government are not treated as second-class citizens. See Jefferson's Declaration of Independence followed by war and the Constitution and Lincoln's Gettysburg Address followed by war and the Civil War Amendments, 13, 14, and 15.
The rule against arbitrary detention by a monarch was enforced at swordpoint by the barons at Runnymede against King John in 1215.
The document that first set forth the rule in Anglo-American jurisprudence appears in Magna Carta. It says, basically, that no person may be held, or property seized, without due process of law ("the law of the land").
This fundamental principle appears at the top of this blog.
It appears in the U.S. constitution in a number of places and manners. We have a due process clause in the 5th Amendment that restricts the federal government.
We have another due process clause in the 14th Amendment that restricts the 50 states, the numerous territories such as Puerto Rico, American Samoa, and the federal District of Columbia. See Bolling v. Sharp, the companion case in D.C. to Brown v. Board (1954).
However we've been detaining people arbitrarily for a very long time. We rounded up American citizens because of their race and ancestry because we were afraid of what we imagined, in our worst-case nightmares, they might do. Fear does that to you. Excessive fear is called paranoia. A lot of law is based on paranoia. Paranoia based law is unjust as a matter of law, reason and morality. You read it here. Salem, 1692, was paranoia based law, prosecution, and hanging.
9-11 produced its share of paranoia based law and official reaction. People were being hauled off planes. Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have been filled to the brim with people that our government says is very bad guys.
Oh, really?
Wonderful. Then why don't you let us know who they are and what they did?
And why don't you bring them into a public courtroom and show your cards, sometimes called "evidence."
And, you know, let the other player in this little drama, the so-called bad-guy, play his hand of cards, such as the one that says:
"You've made a mistake. Got the wrong guy. It's someone else with the same name that you want, not me."
Or,
"You may have found me on a battlefield, but this happens to be where I tend my goats and sheep. That's my house over there. This stick is what I use climbing rocky paths. My long gun here, is what I use to protect my flock and myself from wolves and bandits."
After all, it benefits us not one whit to imprison the innocent and let the guilty continue to make war on our troops, does it.
No, it doesn't.
We're supposed to be the good guys, remember? We play by the rules. I's he bad guys we're fighting who don't play, or fight, by the rules. That's why we're fighting them. But if we don't want to play by the rules, then we're no better than they are, are we.
No, we aren't.
For a review of the importance of our playing by the rules, see the article below: