Rendering the Justices
The Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether the president can order the indefinite military detention of people living in the United States. Since the court’s conservative majority has been friendly to Bush administration claims of extraordinary executive powers, we can probably expect the worst.
When Congress passed the Non-Detention Act in 1971, it specified: “No citizen shall be imprisoned or otherwise detained by the United States except pursuant to an Act of Congress.” But the Bush administration claimed (in the Yaser Hamdi case) that this restriction applies only to detentions by the attorney general, not by the president or by military authorities. In the Jose Padilla case, the U.S. Appeals Court for the 4th Circuit backed the president – despite protests by Janet Reno and by a host of civil liberties groups who have called such detentions illegal.
So let’s say the Supreme Court agrees in March with the 4th Circuit and the Bush administration. But in the meantime, we’ve changed presidents.
Wouldn’t that mean that the new president would have the power to indefinitely detain the five conservative Justices — along with the 4th Circuit Justices and the last three Attorneys General — without any need to present evidence (classified, you know) or to bring charges?
Let’s see now — we know they were plotting to scuttle the Constitution — Scalia to Syria, Thomas to Egypt … they’ll talk all right.