Thread: Dean decimates Gonzales' take on habeas corpus

http://writ.lp.findlaw.com/dean/20070126.html

And for some reason he didn't even determine it necessary to devote a single word to the Uniform Commercial Code.

I believe the whole administration is incompetent including GONZALES.

EXCELLENT POST!
THANK YOU!

This is great stuff!! This is my favorite part:

"Every time Gonzales testifies, he leaves the Constitution a bit more battered by his right-wing gobbledygook and revisionist dogma."



Although I think it should say, Neocon gobbledygook.

Originally Posted by patbrunz

This is great stuff!! This is my favorite part:

"Every time Gonzales testifies, he leaves the Constitution a bit more battered by his right-wing gobbledygook and revisionist dogma."



Although I think it should say, Neocon gobbledygook.

It's not 'rightwing gobbledygook', PAT

It's GLOBALIST heiferdust!

Well, that's a decent article, but it leaves out several important facts or, more appropriately, it glosses over them. Before I make my comments, I want to state plainly that I think that Alberto Gonzales is a jackass and that his concern for safeguarding our liberties is so infinitesimal as to be practically nonexistent.

The first important matter that is overlooked is that the discussion in no way addresses the actual legal status of the Guantanamo detainees. These are foreign nationals detained in the course of a military operation on foreign soil, and they are not technically in the United States, but rather on a US military base. Yes, I know that embassies and such on foreign soil are deemed to be pockets of US soil, but whether military detainees are POWs, foreign citizens on US soil, or some other status has yet to be definitively determined. In fact, the courts have effectively danced around that issue since the detention camp was opened.

More importantly, the Writ of Habeas Corpus is encoded in the common law. This has been well established. It is also noted by the Constitution of the United States. But as established at Article 1, Section 8, Clause 17, there is a separate entity (the federal zone) over which the federal government exercises exclusive jurisdiction. The Slaughterhouse cases established that protections created within the Constitution for the benefit of the citizens of the several states for whom the federal entity had been created and with whom it had compacted DID NOT apply to the federal zone, which is the District of Columbia, its possessions and territories. There is no question that a military base located on foreign soil or within a possession or territory is part of that federal zone to which the Slaughterhouse cases refer. I don't like the idea any more than anyone else because of the likelihood for abuse or unwarranted expansion, but for now that ruling makes suspect the claim of the applicability of any right or privilege under the common law extending to one residing in such an area. The law is murky on this subject to say the least, and judges seem to disagree as to the extent of the privileges and immunities that would be preserved in such an area.

Another point that has been glossed over is the actual terminology employed by the AG. His statement was that there was no "right" of habeas corpus. Strictly speaking, he is correct. It has always been a privilege and is in fact referred to in the Constitution as a privilege. Yes, it's semantics, but half of law is semantics. In his article, John Dean freely interchanges "right" and "privilege," while the two terms are not synonymous.

I hope that the Writ of Habeas Corpus is preserved, but the point is that the case is nowhere near as open and shut as some would have you believe.