In the aftermath of 9/11/01, the Bush Administration has announced plans to form, staff and adjudicate military tribunals to try anyone the U.S. deems a "terrorist." These courts will be presided over by military officers, as will any appeals process, with the final arbiter, either the defense secretary or the president, ending the case.
MILITARY COURTS AND CONGRESS
(Col. Writ. 12/29/01) Copyright 2001 Mumia Abu-Jamal
In the aftermath of 9/11/01, the Bush Administration has
announced plans to form, staff and adjudicate military
tribunals to try anyone the U.S. deems a "terrorist." These
courts will be presided over by military officers, as will
any appeals process, with the final arbiter, either the
defense secretary or the president, ending the case.
No civil judge, of any division or rank of the federal
judiciary, will ever hear any syllable of appeal from
anyone tried before such a tribunal.
So frenzied is the American mood, so supine the
liberal elite, and so prostrate the nation's legal community
to power, that barely a murmur is heard in protest to this
gross, naked power grab by the Administration.
It is not enough that the institution of such courts are
the very antithesis to the grand American claim to
"due process." Nor is it sufficient to argue that such war
measures are inappropriate in the absence of a formal,
congressional declaration of war (this Congress would
have no real trouble doing so). This Congress, already
jittery in light of reports of anthrax contamination of some
offices, rushed through in record speed (with little debate,
no public hearing, and neither a committee report nor a
conference) the unprecedented, complex, and radically
repressive USA Patriot Act.
The presidential decree ordering military tribunals is,
on its face, unconstitutional. Indeed, the very provision
which grants the president Commander In Chief powers,
also limits his powers over judicial matters. Here's what
it says:
[Art. II: Sect. 2, Constitution of the U.S.]
The President shall be Commander in Chief of
the Army and Navy of the United States, ... He
shall have Power, by and with the Advice and
Consent of the Senate ...; and he shall
nominate, and by and with the Advice and
Consent of the Senate, shall appoint ... Judges
of the Supreme Court ...
And from Article III; Section 1 of the Constitution:
The judicial Power of the United States, shall
be vested in one supreme Court, and in such
inferior Courts as the Congress may from
time to time ordain and establish.
There it is. The president, acting in concert
with the Senate, nominates and appoints Supreme
Court judges, and Congress ordains and establishes
new courts.
Congress can't abdicate this duty to the executive.
The president's order establishes a court, one which
has all of its officers under his direct control and
command. This is a classic kangaroo court, of the
very kind that Americans condemned when the Fujimori
regime established them in Peru (interestingly, to fight
'terrorism').
Nor is this meant to heap false praise on U.S.
civil courts, which are fundamentally political
institutions. Have we all forgotten the trial of Tim
McVeigh, the domestic terrorist, where it was later
learned that the FBI withheld thousands of pages of
documents, until days before his execution? Civil
courts merely winked at this violation, as a minor
irritance.
And while the government had its way (by
executing McVeigh) it was embarrassed by
reports of their handling of the case. That won't
happen now, will it?
Under the Bush Administration, military tribunals
serve as an instrument of administrative whim.
Under the command structure of the military, each
judge, each jury, each prosecutor, and each court
officer is a sworn officer of the military, in the sworn
service of the Commander in Chief. If they want to
further their career in the armed services, even if
they ever wanted promotion, they follow their
administrative cues. What do you think they would
do to a foreign national, who is already tagged as
"the enemy"?
With either Bush, the Secretary of Defense, or
even another military panel serving as a Supreme
Court of Appeals, what would be the result?
But, after all, the accused are (to use the term of
popular appeal) 'sand niggers' (the Brits would call
them 'wogs'), Arabs, Pakistanis, a few Afghans - so,
why care?
The same was said in the '20s when Russian
Jews were exiled from the U.S. after the Palmer
Raids, or in the '40s when Japanese were thrown
into concentration camps; they're just 'commie Jews',
or 'slants' - right?
Such events were said to be separate, involving
'others', yet they tainted the judicial process and
U.S. claims of fair play, up to the present generation.
Let us fight this madness, or it will return to haunt
us all.
Copyright 2001 maj
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