To Disappear

The U.S. policy of detention of nationals who are labeled 'enemy combatants' and the evasion of habeas corpus has really got me down in the last couple of days. To think that the U.S. can detain suspects indefinitely abroad as well as in the U.S. (Jose Padilla has been held in a brig in South Carolina for over two and a half years without charges), it is another reminder of where this country has been headed in the years since 9/11. Today the Supreme Court ruled that executing people who committed crimes when they were under 18 constitutes crueel and unusual punishment. This finally removes us from the list of countries endorsing such practices that includes countries with such stellar records on human rights like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan and China. However, in other areas the U.S. is headed towards positions more in line with those countries. To refuse the right of habeas corpus is to deny 800 years of judicial tradition. Beginning with the Magna Carta (in 1215), people had the right to not be held without a verdict from a jury of their peers. In a few instances it has been suspended (in England to deal with the surrender of Napolean; in the U.S. during the Civil War). During the Civil War, it was decided by a vote of Congress and with much contemporaneous and later criticim of the decision. It is unspeakable that a president should deem himself capable under the U.S. constitution to suspeend the right of habeas corpus for anyone, let alone a U.S. citizen. I do now support the actions Padilla was alleged to have taken, but regardless, he is entitled to his day in court for the facts to shed light on the truth. That is the American way and that has been the Western Anglo-American way for almost 800 years. Take the facts as they stand and judgement follows from that and may that be the way towards truth.