Now I am no lawyer or legal expert, but I must confess the Supreme Court ruling neither shocks me nor concerns much at all. I have though gotten a kick out of some of the reporting of the case. A good example of a rather slanted coverage comes from the Washington Post.
“The Supreme Court today delivered a stunning rebuke to the Bush administration over its plans to try Guantanamo detainees before military commissions, ruling that the commissions violate U.S. law and the Geneva Conventions governing the treatment of war prisoners.”
Why is this a “stunning rebuke?” The Supreme Court, in essense, ruled there are no laws on the books that dictate how these detainees can be tried. Well, no kidding. That was part of the problem in the first place. The Court wrote in the majority opinion that Congress can, and in my mind should, draft laws on how to handle the detainees held at Guantanamo Bay. Again, no kidding.
That’s not exactly a rebuke as the vast majority of media outlets portray it as. Nothing, at present, will change. Guantanamo isn’t closing down nor are all the detainees being released. A new law will likely be written and new procedures will be executed. It just so happens that is what everyone wanted to happen with Guantanamo; get something done so we don’t have to pick up our local newspapers and read about how some lawyer for a detainee cries abuse (shocking that a lawyer would say something like that I know).
But what is clear about the ruling, and to be honest there isn’t much that is clear, is that even while the majority of the court ruled in favor of Hamdan, the five jurists couldn’t agree on any of the reasons why they backed Hamdan. The dissenters couldn’t agree on why they backed the govenrment. Justice Thomas wrote the majority opinion, and it is his opinion that will be widely reported upon, but other justices dissented from his opinion even though they sided with him on the majority opinion. So the ruling isn’t as clear cut as is being reported in several outlets and despite what some are saying, the court did not find that the Bush Administration broke U.S. law because there was no U.S. law on the books that addressed these specific people. That was, as they say, part of the entire problem.
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gary - 
Lars - 
Chad - 
Harry F. Langhorne - 
Kenneth Dean ex 1 BFTS -
This ruling was about separation of powers- And SCOTUS’s GROSS violation of separation of powers.
Specifically- Where in the Constitution is SCOTUS granted the power to decide “military necessity?” The President is Commander in Chief.
Where is SCOTUS empowered to violate the laws that it is subject to? Congress CLEARLY stated that SCOTUS had no jurisdiction to rule on Habeas Corpus petitions from those interred at GITMO, including those cases that were pending at the time DTA was passed. Congress has the constitutional authority to pass laws which restrict the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. Congress knew this case to be included in the scope of DTA as it was argued about during floor debates.
The only example of separation of powers we have here is Judiciary trampling the Legislative and Executive branches constitutional authority.
Comment by Matt Carden — Friday, June 30, 2006 @ 12:28 am CDT
Responding to a few of the points raised so far:
SCOTUS has always retained the power to overrule laws it decided were unconstitutional. Most of the sitting justices were appointed by Republican Presidents, not some wide-eyed ultra-liberal. I am a Republican myself, for forty years. In my opinion, these justices in the majority opinion just rendered, seems to support the traditional moderate-Republican ideals.
The President’s powers in wartime are still not that of a dictator. For an interesting reference, please consult actions against the steel industry by President Truman during the Korean War.
Cheers
Comment by NavyHelo — Friday, June 30, 2006 @ 7:10 am CDT