Ok, lets take her for example. Say some group aggravates her. The NRA might, but they're too big to all throw in jail. Say she wants to pick on the Tyranny Response Team. They're small, unknowns with less resources so they'll do just fine.
She points her fat finger at them and says they're a bunch of terrorists. She has them rounded up in the middle of the night as domestic terrorists and traitors. The ones that live through the raid are jailed.
What happens next? Well, under this ruling they get their day in court. Reno has to present evidence to another branch of government. The TRT is acquitted and released.
Barring this ruling they could very well sit in jail for the rest of their lives without a shred of evidence or any charges against them. Just her word and her word alone is all that's needed. I fail to see the difference between that and many countries I'd be ashamed to call home.
This isn't far fetched at all. It's a very plausible situation under most Rat administrations. It horrifies me.
The legal precedent for taking Mr. Padilla into custody couldn't be any clearer. Speaking for the Supreme Court majority in the 1987 Salerno case, Chief Justice Rehnquist held that the incarceration for more than two years without trial or bail of an accused organized crime leader did not under the circumstances violate due process of law:---Robert F. Turner, co-founder of the Center for National Security Law at the University of Virginia School of Law, and former chairman of the ABA Standing Committee on Law and National Security.
"We have repeatedly held that the Government's regulatory interest in community safety can, in appropriate circumstances, outweigh an individual's liberty interest."
Referring specifically to periods of "war or insurrection," the Chief Justice added that "the Government may detain individuals whom the government believes to be dangerous." In the 1961 Lawless case, the European Court of Human Rights similarly upheld as legitimate the extended detention without trial by Great Britain of an accused IRA terrorist because of the national-security emergency.
Especially in times of crisis, our government is often forced to balance competing interests and, to quote the unanimous Supreme Court in the 1909 case of Moyer v. Peabody, "what is due process of law depends on circumstances."
In that case, the governor of Colorado had ordered the arrest by military authorities of an accused insurrection leader. Charles Moyer was confined for months without being charged or tried for any crime and then was released once peace had been restored.
Noting that as commander in chief Governor Peabody was entitled to order the killing of citizens engaged in insurrection, the Court reasoned that he might use the "milder measure of seizing the bodies" of those who stood in the way of peace. This was distinct from the criminal justice process.
"Such arrests are not necessarily for punishment, but are by way of precaution, to prevent the exercise of hostile power." Similarly, when enemy combatants are captured during periods of armed conflict, it is normal practice among civilized nations to confine them-without trial or access to legal counsel-for the duration of the crisis. Mr. Padilla is in a somewhat analogous position today.
In reversing the order of a federal district court judge that Yaser Esam Hamdi (a Taliban combatant born in Louisiana of Saudi parents who now claims U.S. citizenship) was to be given immediate access to legal counsel, a unanimous three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals noted last month that under our Constitution the Executive was entitled to considerable deference from the judiciary on matters involving foreign policy, national security, or military affairs. "This deference extends to military designations of individuals as enemy combatants in times of active hostilities, as well as to their detention after capture," the court noted, adding that the authority "to capture those who take up arms against America belongs to the commander in chief" rather than to the judiciary.
The panel relied in part upon the unanimous 1942 Supreme Court Quirin case, which upheld the apprehension, conviction by military tribunal, and execution of at least one American citizen who had entered the United States with other Nazi saboteurs during World War II. Like Mr. Padilla, the Quirin saboteurs wore civilian clothes and were apprehended unarmed before they actually had an opportunity to engage in violent behavior.
The critics are certainly correct that we must remain eternally vigilant about our civil liberties. But we are in a period of crisis, a crisis legally the equivalent of a declared war. Formal declarations of war are an anachronism -- no country has issued a true declaration of war in more than half-a-century, and such instruments were historically necessary only to initiate major acts of international aggression, which is now illegal under the U.N. Charter. But the Supreme Court held as early as 1800, in Bas v. Tingy, that Congress could "authorize war" by joint resolution without framing it as a formal declaration of war. Last Sept. 14, Congress did precisely that by a combined vote of 516-1.
To date, I believe the president has exceeded reasonable expectations in his handling of the crisis. If the government becomes unnecessarily destructive of civil liberties -- as occurred when Americans of Japanese ancestry were incarcerated during World War II -- there will be ample time for protests and for both Congress and the Courts to act. But the Jose Padilla matter is clearly not such an occasion.
Freeeee, that's a GREAT example. Let's not forget: Janet Reno ALREADY DID THAT at Waco and to some extent in Miami!! She had no "Patriot Act" or "Joint Resolution" behind her...she just acted illegally.
There are no purges in this administration: unlike that of the last World War, when a Democrat administration forcibly removed people of certain ethnicities from their homes. The Department of Defense and the Justice Department are focusing on terrorists.
An interesting argument was made today be a legal eagle on "Special Report" with Brit Hume...he noted that the Joint Resolution of Congress authorized the President to apprehend any terrorist or terrorist sympathizer that might continue the attacks perpetrated by those who carried out 9/11. The judges apparently ruled that CONGRESS is the only body that can authorize the action the President took...but Congress already did that with the Joint Resolution. No discretion was made in that resolution between citizens and non-citizens--just that the President had the discretion to get the terrorists.
Now, if the President were authorizing the rounding up of hundreds of political enemies or DNC donors, or members of N.O.W., such action would be clearly politically motivated. No such action has been taken by this DOD or POTUS. Indeed, all that is known about Padilla is very very bad.
The Mousaouii case is illustrative that holding these proceedings in a court can compromise National Security or, if not, the punishment vetted upon the criminal. I am inclined to accept the Joint Resolution argument.
thanks. rd.
She points her fat finger at them and says they're a bunch of terrorists. She has them rounded up in the middle of the night as domestic terrorists and traitors. The ones that live through the raid are jailed. "
Your example points out just what is wrong with this ruling.
The congress authorized military force against the Al Queda, under it's war power.
Padilla, unlike your example, is (allegedly) subject to military law by act of congress.
The court cravenly did not answer the important question that was before it- how a court should determine whether a citizen is properly held as a renegade- instead it bizarrely pretended that miltary force does not include military detention.