After the September 11th attacks, then-President Bush gave the CIA, and later the military, the authority to kill U.S. citizens abroad “if strong evidence existed that an American was involved in organizing or carrying out terrorist actions against the United States or U.S. interests.” How he managed to give them this authority in the first place remains a mystery, as it is brazenly unconstitutional. As the Sixth Amendment should attest, the drafters of the Constitution never intended to give a single individual – no matter how high the office – the power to execute American citizens on nothing but his own say-so:
“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.”
Like most post-9/11 assaults on our civil liberties, however, what little opposition ever existed to this grotesque expansion of executive power quickly vanished as soon as President Hope and Change was elected. After all, Obama was going to chart a different course than that of his predecessor. He was going to close Gitmo. He was going to close all secret CIA prisons and end rendition. When asked whether he agreed with the Bush administration’s assertion that US citizens could be held without charges, candidate Obama flatly stated, “No. I reject the Bush Administration's claim that the President has plenary authority under the Constitution to detain U.S. citizens without charges as unlawful enemy combatants.”
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Whereas candidate Obama claimed to be deeply suspicious of the Bush-era expansion of executive power, President Obama clearly has no such qualms. With the extra-judicial killing of US-born al Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki, Obama has shown that he now embraces the most egregious abuses of presidential “authority” – not merely in theory, but in practice as well.
And of all the precedents that have been set since the September 11th attacks, it’s hard to imagine any more dangerous than the claim that a single person may, at his or her sole discretion, order the execution of an American citizen without any semblance of due process whatsoever.
I have no reason to believe al-Awlaki was innocent. I don’t think he was a good guy. I don’t actually doubt the government’s claim that he was an evil man who meant to do Americans harm. And I’m not going to shed any tears over dead terrorists. Then again, how do I know one way or the other? The government presented no evidence in court. There was no trial by jury to review the government’s claims or evidence. And yet he was targeted for assassination anyway.
When I heard the news today, I was reminded of a scene from the 1966 film, “A Man For All Seasons,” in which Sir Thomas More argues with William Roper over the importance of the rule of law.
William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!
Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
William Roper: Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
President Obama has now fulfilled President Bush’s threat to become Hitman in Chief - judge, jury, and executioner all rolled into one. Anwar al-Awlaki may indeed have been the Devil himself, but even the Devil should have the benefit of law – not for his sake, but for ours.
2 comments:
It could be argued that Anwar al-Awlaki had renounced his U.S. citizenship.
Tim,
Interesting - I haven't seen any news stories refer to al-Awlaki (or Samir Khan) as former US citizens. And given the controversy, I'd have expected the State Department to publicize the fact that they had renounced. It would have saved the administration some heat.
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