“Your statement makes it sound like “following procedure” automatically makes an order “lawful”. That would mean that an officer merely needs to establish a “procedure” to implement an unlawful order and then it is no longer unlawful.”
You are confusing two different issues. A federal court will look to see if the military court followed correct legal procedures.
OTOH, a order is assumed to be legal unless the person refusing had reason (facts, not opinions) to believe otherwise.
During my time in the military, I refused several orders. For example, I was ordered by my Sq/CC to change my section of an Officer Performance report on one of my subordinates. That was a direct violation of regulations, and I refused to obey. My refusal undoubtedly affected my own OPR, but that was my choice.
I also refused a direct order to alter logbooks that were legal documents. I told the officer that if he would put his order in writing and get it reviewed by legal, I’d do it...but until then, absolutely not. He backed down.
In each case, I was willing to be brought up on charges because I knew the orders were illegal. I wouldn’t have to fish for evidence. I knew what was illegal about each order.
However, I never said, “I refuse to obey, and when it goes to trial, I’ll ask to see every document you have to prove you are a legitimate officer...”
Fine. But in both cases you were exercising your individual judgement about what was lawful and what was not and you were convinced that you were right. Do you believe that a court-martial panel would have been justified in preventing you from presenting evidence of the unlawfulness of the orders?
Should the time come that Lakin is provided subpoena power, I would not be surprised if he is not permitted to subpoena the President himself. But I will be very disappointed if the panel refuses to permit subpoena of documents in the archives of the state of Hawaii.
The burden of proof in this case should be on Lakin and he should be allowed to bear that burden. But the burden of proof of Obama's eligibility was and is on him. It's nonsense what he has been able to hide. What possible repercussions, aside from eligibility, would justify a President of the United States hiding the details of his birth?