There may in fact be a god!
(Thanks to caffeinatedalex for the heads up on this one...I generally only check the news in the morning.)
I have not in fact read the decision in Hamdan, and I know it's not a perfect decision, but what I'm seeing on Scotus looks pretty damn good:
1. That the President's conduct is subject to the limitations of statute and treaty (see, e.g., footnote 23, and the Kennedy and Breyer excerpts that Orin Kerr quotes).
2. That Congress's enactments are best construed to require compliance with the international laws of armed conflict, absent contrary legislative direction.
3. That Common Article 3 of Geneva aplies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. (See also the AMK concurrence: "The provision is part of a treaty the United States has ratified and thus accepted as binding law. By Act of Congress, moreover, violations of Common Article 3 are considered 'war crimes,' punishable as federal offenses, when committed by or against United States nationals and military personnel. See 18 U. S. C. § 2441.") This ruling has enormous implications for the Administration's detention and interrogation practices, because the Administration's legal conclusion that CA3 does not apply, and that we will not apply it as a matter of practice, was the key linchpin to the entire edifice of legal maneuvers that led to waterboarding, hypothermia, degradation, etc. See my post here. Per today's decision, the Administration appears to have been engaged in war crimes, which are subejct to the death penalty. Although I don't think due process would allow prosecution based on conduct previously undertaken on OLC's advice that CA3 did not apply (after all, the Chief Justice concluded, in the D.C. Circuit, that CA3 did not apply), practices going forward are bound to change, and quick.
Let's freaking hope so! The Guantanamo folks don't get the whole ball of wax, but as we all know even the bare MINIMUM under article 3 is a hell of a lot more human treatment than they've been getting.
At last, an affirmation that the President has to look to Congress and the law to govern his conduct; this is a democracy with 3 branches, and it's time the Bush administration started acting like it. I can't decide which is better- that, or the fact that the decision was 5-3, meaning that even if Roberts had come in on the side of the hail-king-bush justices, they still would have lost. :D Hurray! This is the best news out of the Supreme Court in years.
I have not in fact read the decision in Hamdan, and I know it's not a perfect decision, but what I'm seeing on Scotus looks pretty damn good:
1. That the President's conduct is subject to the limitations of statute and treaty (see, e.g., footnote 23, and the Kennedy and Breyer excerpts that Orin Kerr quotes).
2. That Congress's enactments are best construed to require compliance with the international laws of armed conflict, absent contrary legislative direction.
3. That Common Article 3 of Geneva aplies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. (See also the AMK concurrence: "The provision is part of a treaty the United States has ratified and thus accepted as binding law. By Act of Congress, moreover, violations of Common Article 3 are considered 'war crimes,' punishable as federal offenses, when committed by or against United States nationals and military personnel. See 18 U. S. C. § 2441.") This ruling has enormous implications for the Administration's detention and interrogation practices, because the Administration's legal conclusion that CA3 does not apply, and that we will not apply it as a matter of practice, was the key linchpin to the entire edifice of legal maneuvers that led to waterboarding, hypothermia, degradation, etc. See my post here. Per today's decision, the Administration appears to have been engaged in war crimes, which are subejct to the death penalty. Although I don't think due process would allow prosecution based on conduct previously undertaken on OLC's advice that CA3 did not apply (after all, the Chief Justice concluded, in the D.C. Circuit, that CA3 did not apply), practices going forward are bound to change, and quick.
Let's freaking hope so! The Guantanamo folks don't get the whole ball of wax, but as we all know even the bare MINIMUM under article 3 is a hell of a lot more human treatment than they've been getting.
At last, an affirmation that the President has to look to Congress and the law to govern his conduct; this is a democracy with 3 branches, and it's time the Bush administration started acting like it. I can't decide which is better- that, or the fact that the decision was 5-3, meaning that even if Roberts had come in on the side of the hail-king-bush justices, they still would have lost. :D Hurray! This is the best news out of the Supreme Court in years.