A federal judge in South Carolina ruled yesterday that the Bush administration lacks statutory and constitutional authority to indefinitely imprison without criminal charges a U.S. citizen who was designated an "enemy combatant."
Rejecting a series of arguments put forward by the government, District Court Judge Henry F. Floyd said the indefinite detention of Jose Padilla -- who the administration has said is a terrorist supporter of al Qaeda -- is illegal and that Padilla must be released from a naval brig in Charleston, S.C., within 45 days or charged with a crime [...] Using a phrase often levied by conservatives to denigrate liberal judges, Floyd -- who was appointed by President Bush to the federal bench in 2003 -- accused the administration of engaging in "judicial activism" when it asserted in court pleadings that Bush has blanket authority under the Constitution to detain Americans on U.S. soil who are suspected of taking or planning actions against the country.
Floyd said the government presented no law supporting this contention and that just because Bush and his appointees say Padilla's detention was consistent with U.S. laws and the president's war powers, that did not make it so. "Moreover, such a statement is deeply troubling. If such a position were ever adopted by the courts, it would totally eviscerate the limits placed on Presidential authority to protect the citizenry's individual liberties." [...]
So let's see -- going back to 2003, according to the Findlaw case history, the government now has an essentially unbroken string of losses in this case. "Essentially" only because the Supreme Court case the first time through was something of a draw; the government didn't win the point it was arguing, but Padilla didn't get his way either. The Court turfed the issue for jurisdictional reasons, although the minority dissent thought that they should hear the case on its merits, and I'm sure that all nine of the justices realized that they were going to get this case again. They were likely hoping that the government would come to its senses and make this case moot. However, to date, not only have they not done so, but now they have agreement across districts that they're in the wrong.
The truly fascinating thing to see -- assuming that this case wends its way through the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court for the (hopefully) inevitable administration smackdown before the end of the reign of King George -- will be to see whether the government abides by the various court decisions, once its appeals are exhausted. Judging by what's happening in other cases, what will likely happen is that the government will finally charge Padilla ... but then, due to "security reasons," it will decline to tell Padilla with what, precisely, he's being charged, what the evidence against him is, or what the legal arguments regarding his case actually are. This has been pattern and practice to date; despite being smacked down repeatedly by the courts on those issues, they don't seem to feel the need to change.
Posted by iain at March 01, 2005 02:46 AM
