Can you trust your fellow Americans?

Monday, November 20, 2006

Jacob Hornberger’s Commentary


The temptation to which many Americans have succumbed in the cases of Jose Padilla and Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri is that Americans don’t need to be concerned because they involve only two cases. “When they begin rounding up hundreds of Americans, then that’s when I’ll take a stand,” is what some Americans might be thinking. “Right now, my life is just too busy to stake a stand.”

Padilla is the American citizen who the Justice Department turned over to the U.S. military as an “enemy combatant” in the “war on terrorism,” and denied him right to counsel, right to due process, and right to trial by jury. After securing a ruling upholding such power from the federal court of appeals and before the Supreme Court could overrule the decision, the Justice Department retook control over Padilla, had him indicted, and put him in the jurisdiction of U.S. district court. His trial is scheduled for January. According to Padilla, he was tortured and injected with LSD or some other mind-altering drug during his captivity. A motion to dismiss based on the torture allegations is currently pending.

Al-Marri is a foreigner who was arrested here in the United States and actually was under indictment in federal district court. On the eve of trial, the Justice Department yanked him out of federal court jurisdiction and transferred him to the U.S. military as an “enemy combatant.” Al-Marris has been questioning his detention through habeas corpus proceedings. However, with the recent passage of the Military Commissions Act, which canceled the constitutional right of habeas corpus for foreigners accused of terrorism, the Justice Department is now claiming that al-Marri no longer has any right to question his detention in federal court and is subject to remaining imprisoned for the rest of his life, at the discretion of U.S. military officials.

If the government begins rounding up dozens or hundreds of Americans and treats them like Padilla or al-Marri, what are the chances that Americans who have remained silent about the Padilla or al-Marri cases will then openly stand up and take a stand, especially if the Supreme Court has upheld the power to torture and indefinitely detain? Answer: Virtually none. Because if Americans are too fearful or too busy to take a stand when it mattered — at the inception of the tyranny — there is little possibility that they will have the courage to stand up when hundreds are being rounded up, especially since they could become part of those being rounded up. It will be much easier for such Americans to continue their silent acquiescence, secure in the knowledge that they will be left alone as they pursue their busy lives.