TOMORROW a number of the detainees held at Guantanamo Bay will finally get their day in court - although, alas, not literally. Thirty-five Americans who were arrested at the US Supreme Court last January during a demonstration protesting the illegal detention center will go on trial in Washington. They are charged with “causing a harangue.” Instead of entering their own names, each defendant will enter the name of a prisoner held at Guantanamo. Father Bill Pickard, a Catholic priest from Pennsylvania, will identify himself as Faruq Ali Ahmed. “He cannot do it himself,” Pickard says, “so I am called by my faith, my respect for the rule of law, and my conscience to do it for him.”
The protesters acted on Jan. 11, the sixth anniversary of the establishment of the US detention center at Guantanamo. They were demanding the restoration of habeas corpus - the right of the prisoners to have their day in court. Wearing orange jumpsuits and hoods, the protesters were decrying torture and degradation. The sleeplessness, waterboarding, insults to Islam. Some of the arrested were in the act of unfurling a banner that said with eloquent simplicity, “Close Guantanamo.” They broke the law because, despite widespread repugnance at what the Bush administration is doing in Cuba, the laws and institutions of the United States have so far abetted this criminal indecency.
Twice the US Supreme Court has ruled against Bush on Guantanamo (affirming habeas corpus for detainees in 2004, and ruling against military commissions in 2006), but Congress bailed Bush out with the Military Commissions Act in 2006. Over the years, Guantanamo has been criticized by human rights groups, other governments, the United Nations, associations of lawyers, and members of the military’s own judicial system. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and even Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates have both called for the detention center to be shut down. But it does not happen: Today there are nearly 300 prisoners there. Last week, the Justice Department inspector general released a report showing that FBI agents on the scene in Guantanamo have, over years, condemned the interrogation methods as illegal. “We found no evidence,” the report concludes, “that the FBI’s concerns influenced DOD interrogation policies.” No evidence, in sum, that the outrage at Guantanamo is being corrected by business as usual.
That is why, in an image offered by retired admiral John D. Hutson, the former judge advocate general of the Navy, the defendants “called artillery in on their own position” by engaging in civil disobedience at the Supreme Court. It was “heroic action,” Hutson said, “taken in a desperate situation for a greater good. That’s essentially what these 35 courageous Americans are doing.”
Can one break the law to uphold the principle of law? That will cease being the question tomorrow when the names of 35 incarcerated men are stated aloud in a courtroom - names that should have been spoken before a judge years ago. When that happens, the questions will become: Why are those men themselves not before a judge in a US court of law? And why are their torturers not charged with crimes? How is it possible that the American judicial system is itself protecting this rank violation of the American judicial system?
Last December, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Boumediene v. Bush, another case concerning the legal rights of Guantanamo Bay detainees. The ruling is to come, yet another opportunity for decisive intervention. But beyond the arcane, and so far impotent, redress-procedures of government lies the question of the broad US population’s attitude. Is the American commitment to basic rights really so shallow as to allow this travesty to continue? When did torture become acceptable? And once having widely denounced torture, what are citizens to do when it does not stop?
The group that goes on trial tomorrow calls itself “Witness Against Torture.” They are average folks from across the country. They could not stand it anymore. They did the only thing left for them to do. They went to Washington and caused a harangue. They purposely represent individuals held in torture cells. And, perhaps, they represent a lot of their fellow citizens, too. Close Guantanamo.
James Carroll’s column appears regularly in the Globe.
© 2008 The Boston Globe
Please ALERT the world once democracy is ruling the USA again. For the time being I compare the USA with China, Russia to name a few.
The American people didn’t see dictatorship happening in their own country.
Just take a look at Admiral Mullen’s cozy quarters on Guantanamo bay and just read that tidbit in the last paragraph. Keep in mind this is from January.
Now yesterday we get a bit of a warning for our Military in theatre from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs dear Admiral Mullen. He sent an ‘all hands’ letter that according to many high ranking Officers the likes of whic has not been seen in 40 years or so. Telling all Branches of the Active Duty Military that they must remain apolitical, no politiking allowed. HUH????
I admire these protestors! They are very courageous!
“causing a harangue” is now a crime?
where will this end?
“casting a skeptical glance”?
“appearing unenthusiastic”?
Guantanamo is a disgrace, an abomination. All of the US is a Guantanamo now.
“America” is dead.
According to the Random House Dictionary, a harangue is “a long, passionate and vehement speech esp. one delivered before a public gathering.”
I’ve provided criminal defense for protestors in various state and federal court proceedings during the last 30 years, but I’ve never heard of an anti-harangue prosecution. At first blush, it sure looks like pure First Amendment to me.
Bill from Saginaw
Turce, i read the article you link to. very interesting. mullen wnats to close gitmo, not because it is a place where people are tortured but because it tarnishes the image of the good ol’ usa…
the last paragraph is perplexing(and scary).
“… Mullen got a look at a site on the eastern shore of Guantanamo Bay — opposite the terrorist detention center — where the U.S. military is building a new refugee camp that would be used in the event of a sudden, major influx of refugees in the area. Initially the camp will be designed to hold 10,000 refugees and is scheduled to be finished by June.”
WTF? what refugees? in cuba?
i am perplexed
How can the US critcize the HR record of China or Russia or others.
It is just as bad
the Canadian Supreme court has ruled Gitmo is in violation of canadian and International Human Rights Laws.
Hopefully Canadian PM “Little Stevie” Harper will be tried as a co-conspirator with Bush
10,000 refugees in Cuba? Is this forewarning of an attack? Remember, We just stationed a nuclear task force in the Caribbean [Number 4 - the only one not operating in the Pacific and Mid East]. It is also under the navy’s command - supposedly, it is there to interdict drugs and Haitian boat people headed for the US.
Six months, what damage can Bush cause as he approaches the end? Too much, IMO.
I just realized this might be the very best reason for impeaching Bush - It would give him and his buddies something more to think about then the Apocalypse.
“the Canadian Supreme court has ruled Gitmo is in violation of canadian and International Human Rights Laws.”
Not quite, canuckchuck. The Canadian Supreme court cited the US Supreme Court to rule that Gitmo violated both US and International Law.
The Supreme Court hangs in a precarious balance. The far-right STAR Chamber (Scalia, Thomas, Alito and Roberts), also known as the RATS, needs just one more fellow traveler to make the court a reliable rubber stamper of Bush’s outrages upon the Constitution, laws and moral decency. Should a vacancy occur, the Senate Democrats must at all events refuse to confirm any Bush nominee, leaving the slot open until January 21, 2009 in hopes of an Obama victory. If McCain wins, considering his enthusiasm for Federalist Society Vyshinskys and Quislings, God help us.
Franklin called it a Republic, if we can kept it.
We’ll see what the Bush Family Retainers call it.
After maiming Lady Liberty and murdering Magna Carta
I see little hope of redresses from toadies in black dresses.
Much respect to the protestors, big ups!
Close Guantanamo illegal prison, burn dem.
Wow, thirteen whole responses to this story.
I won’t go back to the States until Americans, and I’m talking about my friends who can’t help being Americans, and my kid, who can’t either, get the habeas corpus thing.
If I enter the US, or attempt to enter the US, or have to fly over the US to get to or from somewhere else by flying over or landing on US soil, whether I intended to or not, if I do, and some asshole takes a dislike to me, I can be seized and consigned indefinitely to some oubliette somewhere. Actually, I don’t have to do the flying over or landing on at all: the US kidnaps people from wherever, routinely, and as long as they aren’t American citizens, American citizens don’t give a flying fuck. Nice country you got there.
Trouble is, I care - personally, conretely, abstractly. It breaks my heart that this no-go decision is one I can’t fudge. Habeas corpus is just basic. I can pass, having a nice Anglo-Saxon name and pale skin and whatnot. But if I go afoul of a GWB brownshirt, and say the wrong word or have the wrong name or whatever when I’m crossing over, I could - perfectly legally, mind you, given that you’ve all be too wrapped up in being American to care much about about human rights - be consigned to the Guantanamo oubliette FOREVER, and it’s clear that Americans won’t take to the streets to get me out.
Thank goodness I have two non-American citizenships. It’s not exactly comforting that they’re Canadian and British, Blair and Harper. But we’ve still got habeas corpus, and Americans don’t.
BERLIN (AFP) - Germany has been hit by another privacy scandal, with telecoms giant Deutsche Telekom joining discount food chain Lidl and the state among those accused of secretly tracking individuals.
On Monday, Deutsche Telekom, the biggest European telecoms operator by revenue, was in full damage control mode, with chief executive Rene Obermann telling the mass
circulation daily Bild that all cases of surveillance “must be clarified and result in severe consequences.”
“causing a harangue” is now a crime!
This will end with the Thought Police no doubt.
“Words mean what I say they mean” said the White Rabbit. And who of us can ‘prove’ that they have not committed the Thought Crime of thinking about a White Rabbit…
Hmmmm. I don’t quite understand your “not quite” objection. Courts (at least those that operate under the same fundamental principles of law) often cite one another’s precedents in arriving at their decisions. Doing so doesn’t, in any way, invalidate or alter their own rulings.
realdim,
I feel your pain. I am not so fortunate as to possess any sort of non-American citizenship benefits (fleeting as they may be as you aptly wrote) but I do have personal, concrete, and abstract ties to family and friends still ensconsed in the dwindling empire that is America. I fear for them.
But I also fear for myself. I live in Taiwan. Foreigners here should fear the U.S. administration. The sad fact is, so should locals. The bizarre thing is that locals don’t have (and so far needn’t have) fear of China. Sure if you travel to China, THINGS MAY HAPPEN TO YOU. But even China has not yet dived into the cesspool of overt rendition processes the way the criminal (let’s be honest about it) administration in the U.S. has forced down the throats of Americans as necessary and just.
I may be wrong. I welcome elucidation.
Failing that, it becomes clear that what the world must rationally fear most is the U.S. How sad.
I have not heard this issue brought up by McCain, Obama or Clinton much. Sad.
As long as the Republicans and Democrats ignore issues like these, they will never have my vote. More reason to work toward the elimination of the 2-party system. It is one monster with 2 heads.