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Can you guess which Bush administration official said this last month?
“The Constitution doesn’t say every individual in the United States or every citizen is granted or assured the right to habeas [corpus]. It doesn’t say that.”
If you guessed Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, you’re correct. In fact, the Constitution states that habeas corpus rights cannot be suspended except in times of rebellion or invasion. For centuries, this has meant that a person could challenge his or her detention in an independent court of law – unless those exceptional circumstances existed.
Gonzales’s declaration should strike fear in all of us. His dangerous comments before the Senate Judiciary Committee betrayed the Constitutional rights he was sworn to protect as our nation’s top law enforcement official…and defied common sense, too. Watch the video!
An additional blow to the rule of law came just this week – when a federal appeals court ruled that civilian courts no longer have the authority to consider habeas claims by people held in Guantanamo Bay.
I’m asking you to join me in fighting back by intensifying our campaign to reverse the Bush administration’s wrong-headed policies that are devastating core American values.
The principle of habeas corpus is as fundamental to our democracy as the idea of “innocent until proven guilty.” Alberto Gonzales’s remarks are an outrage and an affront to all that our great nation stands for.
Sincerely,
Larry Cox
Executive Director
Amnesty International USA
Filed under: cynthia mckinney, social & economic justice Tagged: | Uncategorized
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