Obama Administration Announces Trials Of 9/11 Terrorists In US Civilian Courts
Frankly, I thought the Bush administration had solved this problem appropriately with the Military Commissions Act which would have allowed these enemy combatants to be tried in a military justice forum. I’d point out that the MCA, in section 7, states the following: “No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.”
Further, Article III Section 2 of the Constitution states:
In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a state shall be party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.
Given that the Constitution also grants Congress the power to establish and define jurisdiction for all other federal courts outside of the Supreme Court what’s clear here is that they can decide what cases the federal courts can and cannot hear. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court ignored the Constitution and ruled the MCA to be unconstitutional. And so now we’ve got terrorists in our federal court system.
TOKYO, Japan (CNN) –Accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed “will be subject to the most exacting demands of justice,” President Obama said Friday.
“The American people insist on it, and my administration will insist on it,” Obama told reporters at a joint news conference with Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama.
He was responding to a reporter’s question about media reports that Mohammed will be tried in a federal court in New York, instead of by a military commission.
The problem here is that these terrorists are not US citizens or even just common international criminals. They are enemy combatants captured in a war and should be handled accordingly.
