NEWS: King George W. and the Habeas Corpus

POLITICS: King George W. and the Habeas Corpus

Louis, by the grace of God, King of France and Navarre, to all present and to come, greeting from the year 1708:



One of the most useful tools of an absolute monarch like me are lettres de cachet, which may be translated as "seal letters". You might not be familiar with this term. In my time, a seal letter (in its narrow sense) is a direct order from the king by which a subject is sentenced without trial and without an opportunity of defense to imprisonment in a state prison or an ordinary jail, confinement in a convent or a hospital, transportation to the colonies, or expulsion to another part of the realm. It's a common practice - not a practice I'm particularly proud of, but sometimes necessary to lock away potentially dangerous individuals and maintain the power of the crown. In other terms, it's the standard procedure to dungeon political prisoners. This is how absolute monarchy works.



However, most of you are living in a democracy, and your time considers seal letters symbols of the abuses of what you call "absolutism". That's why the founders of your democracies invented the writ of habeas corpus, which is basically a legal procedure through which a person can seek relief from unlawful detention of himself or another person. It has been praised as being one of the cornerstones of individual freedom and democracy. Leaders have now to justify themselves when they dungeon someone. This is how democracy works.



However, the habeas corpus can be somewhat unhandy when dealing with politically motivated arrests, for example, of supposed terrorists. That's why the U.S. Government had this really great idea: build a prison outside the U.S. borders such that they can imprison people without any trial. I'm the last one who could condemn political imprisonment - but, as far as I understand, this is not how democracy works.



Now it seems that democracy strikes back. In the case Boumediene vs. Bush, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed on June 12 the habeas corpus rights of detainees in Guantanamo:

The full text as PDF



Whereas I feel with King George W., Rex Christianissimus Americae, that he can no more sign lettres de cachet, I have to admit that this court decision is a victory for democracy. As you might have guessed, I'm not a big fan of democracy - but, if you do it, you should do it correctly. If you give the power to the people, you can't take it away with the other hand. And, luckily for you, democracy has mechanisms like the Supreme Court to prevent political leaders to undermine its very basic principles.



This is how democracy works.



Given at Versailles in the month of June, in the year of grace 1708, and of our reign the sixty sixth.

i still find it a bit shocking to realize that not everyone thinks the Constitution should guide the US's actions even when it is acting outside its own borders. the Constitution was written to establish a single country, sure, but the text of it is clear on the point that we as a nation believe the principles laid down in that document should be applied to all people.

your highness touched on a point that i feel may not be discussed enough--that is, the ramifications of the duration of the 'war on terror'. many of the pro-Bush arguments i see have the subtext of "it's only temporary". the thinking seems to be that this terrorism thing is an emergency, and a strong hand is needed to deal with it before it gets out of control. the simple fact is that it's already out of control, and was out of control for a decade (or more, depending on who you ask) before 11SEP2001.

however a person feels about (for instance) Gitmo, i think it would take a very foolish person to suggest that policies which produce detention centers such as Gitmo are sustainable. do we really want to be secretly snatching people and shipping them off to Guantanamo Bay fifty years from now? even if you believe that suspending habeus corpus in the case of 'unlawful combatants' is okay, surely you understand that such a practice is prone to horrible abuse?

the 'war on terror' is, like it or not, a long-term battle. we need to fight it with thoughtful policies in keeping with the basic values we hold as a nation, not with emergency measures that encroach further and further on our freedoms.

Yes, and the process of incrementalism is important to note here. With an indefinite duration, each successive growth of state power and withering away of legal protections seems like a perfectly rational step from the previous, in otherwards, "what's the big deal?" Recognizing this vector is important, because of the direction it goes in. If each movement advances it further along the same course, there can be no doubt that eventually it will cross into something you will find unacceptable, but by the time it does, your abilty to further resist its progress will be greatly diminished (or in other words, it's too fucking late)

well, to be fair, the Sun King did state democracies, plural, and the USA is of a similar manner of democracy as that of Brittan, after a fashion.

I was going to say. Good article, nonetheless.

You are right, Sire, my fault. I now remember having had a conversation with Charles II about this act. It was in fact passed by the Parliament of England which is at the time I'm writing those lines far from being a democratic institution. If I remember well, Charles was not very happy about this act, but gave his Royal Assent for political reasons..

I later heared a rumour that when the Lords voted about the bill, it passed only because a very fat lord was accorded 10 votes - meant as a joke, but taken seriously by mistake. I don't know whether or not this story is true.

Another interesting read to scroll through.

Although it's sad it came to this. And how do you think the two recent Bush appointees voted on decision that really should have been unanimous?

1 Cranch 137. Nice.

Separation of powers will kick. you. in. the. ass.

Napoleon was better bitches!

at pissing off everybody else? yes, yes indeed.

Ron Paul 1708!!