Measures Seek to Restrict Detainees’ Access to Courts

[cal04]

Although the effort has been partly obscured by the highly publicized wrangling over military commissions for war crimes trials, the Bush administration and its allies in Congress are trying to use the same legislation to strip federal courts of their authority to review the detentions of almost all terrorism suspects.

Both the legislation introduced on behalf of the administration and the competing bill sponsored by a group of largely Republican opponents in the Senate include a provision that would bar foreigners held abroad from using the federal trial courts for challenges to detention known as habeas corpus lawsuits. If the provision were enacted, it would mean that all of the lawsuits brought in federal court by about 430 detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, would be wiped from the books.

On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee rejected an effort by opponents to strike that provision from the House bill by a party-line vote, with all 15 Republicans present voting to leave it in and all 12 Democrats voting against it. Then, after some initial difficulty in getting approval for the bill, the committee passed it on to the full House.

Representative Martin T. Meehan, Democrat of Massachusetts, who has taken a leading role in trying to counter the administration’s efforts, said that stripping the federal courts of the right to hear habeas corpus challenges “raised grave constitutional questions.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/21/washington/21habeas.html?hp&ex=1158811200&en=42d736eddb2f98cb&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[spindrifter]

1. Measures Seek to Restrict Detainees’ Access to Courts (NYT)

By NEIL A. LEWIS and KATE ZERNIKE
Published: September 21, 2006

WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — Although the effort has been partly obscured by the highly publicized wrangling over military commissions for war crimes trials, the Bush administration and its allies in Congress are trying to use the same legislation to strip federal courts of their authority to review the detentions of almost all terrorism suspects.

Both the legislation introduced on behalf of the administration and the competing bill sponsored by a group of largely Republican opponents in the Senate include a provision that would bar foreigners held abroad from using the federal trial courts for challenges to detention known as habeas corpus lawsuits. If the provision was enacted, it would mean that all of the lawsuits brought in federal court by about 430 detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, would be wiped from the books.

On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee rejected an effort by opponents to strike that provision from the House bill by a party-line vote, with all 15 Republicans present voting to leave it in and all 12 Democrats voting against it. Then, after some initial difficulty in getting approval for the bill, the committee passed it on to the full House.

Representative Martin T. Meehan, Democrat of Massachusetts, who has taken a leading role in trying to counter the administration’s efforts, said that stripping the federal courts of the right to hear habeas corpus challenges “raised grave constitutional questions.”

<more>

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/21/washington/21habeas.html?hp&ex=1158811200&en=42d736eddb2f98cb&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[JDPriestly]

2. The Bush administration is just one never ending constitutional

crisis. Beginning with the Supreme Court's intervention into a state matter to appoint Bush, there has been a continuous attack on the constitution.

[praeclarus]

3. each new thing is more audacious than the last...

... it's getting to the point of kind of scary.

[DeepModem Mom]

4. kick

[bemildred]

5. 2 Drafted for Vote on Terror Bill

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration's national security agenda lurched forward in Congress on Wednesday after House Republicans narrowly headed off a politically embarrassing defeat for the White House over legislation establishing military tribunals for terrorism suspects.

The tribunal legislation — and a companion bill authorizing the administration's warrantless wiretapping program — remained on track to be taken up by the House next week before Congress recesses. But there were signs that the two proposals might face more resistance than expected from the president's usual allies.

The House Judiciary Committee was forced to resort to parliamentary gimmickry to force a second vote Wednesday hours after the tribunal bill was unexpectedly defeated. The committee reversed itself by a single vote after Republicans rounded up missing colleagues.

Separately, the House Intelligence Committee approved a bill that would put into law the administration's surveillance program, which monitors the international phone calls and e-mails of persons in the U.S. who are suspected of having ties to terrorists. But its chief sponsor said final action was unlikely before the Nov. 7 elections. The House Judiciary Committee also approved a scaled-down version of the surveillance bill Wednesday.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-tribunals21sep21,1,920166.story?coll=la-headlines-nation