Among the objections from Congressional Republicans to transferring Guantanamo detainees from Cuba to Illinois is the fear that the prisoners will suddenly have many more rights by virtue of being on U.S. soil.
But is that true?
Actually, it’s not clear, Scott Silliman, a professor at Duke University More…
Praising an Italian court’s recent ruling that CIA agents broke the law in an extraordinary rendition case, The New York Times today highlights a growing phenomenon that hasn’t received sufficient attention: European courts appear more willing than their American counterparts to enforce the laws protecting basic human and More…
The influential Center for American Progress, which has close ties to the Obama administration, is now calling on President Obama to push back the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention center to July. That’s despite the president’s day-two directive to close the notorious prison More…
The National Defense Authorization Act, passed yesterday by the House of Representatives, includes a largely overlooked provision that modifies the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which allows the government to try certain terror suspects — now called “unprivileged enemy belligerents” instead of the Bush-era term, “unlawful enemy combatants” More…
In announcing on Wednesday that it would review a case that asks whether individuals have a fundamental right to bear arms under the U.S. Constitution, the Supreme Court did more than just step into a heated debate over gun control. Although McDonald v. City of Chicago is on its face More…
A federal court on Tuesday ruled for the first time ever that the government cannot freeze an organization’s assets for suspected ties to terror financing without first obtaining a warrant.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio had filed the lawsuit in November 2008 on behalf of an More…
What is “incorporation?”
Among the many legal terms mentioned over the last four days of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings, the term “incorporation,” when it comes to the Second Amendment right to bear arms, is probably the most confusing.
Incorporation in this context refers to whether the Bill More…
In yet another 5-4 ruling Thursday, the Supreme Court denied a man imprisoned for a rape and attempted murder he says he didn’t commit the right to the DNA evidence that would prove his guilt or innocence.
Concluding that this is a matter for state legislatures, not the federal More…
Attorney General Eric Holder today faced a slew of questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee about just what sort of legal process the Obama administration plans to provide for detainees that the president deems “too dangerous” to release, yet who for whatever reason cannot be tried in a U.S. court More…
Assuming for the sake of argument that the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment does apply to U.S. conduct outside of U.S. territory, (though as I noted before the Office of Legal Counsel lawyers thought it did NOT), the May 30, More…
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