Con Law 101

From today's NYT:

The Constitution does make the president “commander in chief,” a title President Bush often invokes. But it does not have the sweeping meaning he suggests. The framers took it from the British military, which used it to denote the highest-ranking official in a theater of battle. Alexander Hamilton emphasized in Federalist No. 69 that the president would be “nothing more” than “first general and admiral,” responsible for “command and direction” of military forces.

The founders would have been astonished by President Bush’s assertion that Congress should simply write him blank checks for war. They gave Congress the power of the purse so it would have leverage to force the president to execute their laws properly. Madison described Congress’s control over spending as “the most complete and effectual weapon with which any constitution can arm the immediate representatives of the people, for obtaining a redress of every grievance, and for carrying into effect every just and salutary measure.”

Read it all. Congress is certainly well within its intended authority to use the power of the purse to affect the President's foriegn and military policy. That's the whole point.

RFSJ

This Time They Didn't Get It Right

Yesterday, the NYT reported:


WASHINGTON, June 14 — The Supreme Court ruled 5 to 4 today that an Ohio prisoner’s challenge of his murder conviction must be thrown out because he missed a filing deadline by a few days — not through his or his lawyer’s fault, but because a federal judge made a mistake.

On a technicality that was actually an error by a federal judge and not the attorney or his client, the Supreme Court denied the appeal. According to the majority opinion written by Justice Thomas, federal appeals courts “routinely and uniformly dismiss untimely appeals,” and that the case of Mr. Bowles should be no exception.

And get this. Apparently we in the hoi polloi could not possibly understand what was going on, so Justice Thomas had to explain it to us:


Justice Thomas, apparently conceding that some people, especially nonlawyers, might be flabbergasted that a judge’s error could undo an appeal, noted: “Because Congress decides, within constitutional bounds, whether federal courts can hear cases at all, it can also determine when, and under what conditions, federal courts can hear them.”

In vigourous dissent:

In dissent, Justice Souter said the Supreme Court should have granted an exception to the 14-day limit, “as it certainly seems reasonable to rely on an order from a federal judge.”

“As a member of the federal judiciary, I cannot help but think that reliance on our orders is reasonable,” Justice Souter wrote. “I would also rest better knowing that my innocent errors will not jeopardize anyone’s rights unless absolutely necessary.”

I completely agree. I cannot believe that a defendant's constitutional rights to a full appeal were denied by a technicality that harmed no one, and by a federal jusdge at that. I'm appalled.

And you know how many days we're talking about? Three! Three lousy days!

Read it all and weep for our country, that routinely denies people the basic rights that all people, as both citizens and as children of God, should be able to enjoy.

RFSJ

So I Went to See The Yankees

Yesterday evening, my friend and I went to see the Yankees play the Diamondbacks at Yankee Stadium. It was a good game once it got started, but there was rain for a bit and so the first pitch wasn't until about 8:10 PM. That delayed everything just enough that it was just the middle of the 7th inning when we had to leave to catch trains and whatnot back to New Jersey. The Yankees won 4-1 and my man C.M. Wang got the win. It was neat to see him play. I found myself taking far more interest in his performance than I normally would for a pitcher. In fact, normally I'd prefer a high-scoring game - much more exciting, right? Not this time. I was perfectly glad to have Wang hold them to 1 run in his 7 innings - he got an excellent ERA out of this outing.

So it's the 7th Inning Stretch and we are all asked to get up and remove our hats for "God Bless America." I was expecting "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" but not this. ("Take Me Out" came after.) I have to confess I was a bit disconcerted about it. It's a tradition at Yankee Stadium to sing this since 9-11, so reports Wikipedia. Here are the full lyrics, from ScoutSongs.com:

"While the storm clouds gather far across the sea,
Let us swear allegiance to a land that's free,
Let us all be grateful for a land so fair,
As we raise our voices in a solemn prayer. "

God Bless America,
Land that I love.
Stand beside her, and guide her
Thru the night with a light from above.
From the mountains, to the prairies,
To the oceans, white with foam
God bless America, My home sweet home.

As I review these lyrics now, a day later, they aren't so bad. and I had no problem with the Star Spangled Banner, which I love to sing (mostly, I suspect, because I can actually negotiate the entire range of that almost-unsingable song). So why my angst? I kept thinking, "Well, God surely blesses all of God's people, no matter what country they are in. So why is America any different, any more special?" I mean, doesn't God want to bless England, and Wales, and France, and India, and China and yes, even Iraq, and all its people, as well? Are not all people everywhere created imago Dei and beloved by God? Is it somehow wrong to ask for blessings on one's own nation? Does doing so imply that there is only so much blessing mojo and God can't bless more than one nation at a time? Even and especially in times of war, do not armies pray that God will certainly favor them with victory and the enemy with destruction? I mean, that part is definitely a zero-sum game: if God blesses my enemy, then I'm probably out of luck. And it begs the question, at least for me: what does it mean to pray for one's enemies and bless those who persecute one?

It turns out there are some legal issues with this as well, that are well worth reading on the Sports Law Blog.

RFSJ

Catching Up On The News...

Last year while teaching at Hunter College I had my seminar look at the actions of the Bush Administration and Congress regarding the writ of habeus corpus and its denial to enemy combatants. I was please to note in yesterday's NYT the following:

Judges Say U.S. Can't Hold Man as 'Combatant'

The federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., ruled yesterday that the president may not declare civilians in this country to be “enemy combatants” and have the military hold them indefinitely. The ruling was a stinging rejection of one of the Bush administration’s central assertions about the scope of executive authority to combat terrorism.

A civilian must be tried as a civilian, in other words. You just can't take anyone off the street and declare him an unlawful enemy combatant with or without a hearing and then hold them indefinitely.

Here's the money quote:

“To sanction such presidential authority to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain civilians,” Judge Motz wrote, “even if the president calls them ‘enemy combatants,’ would have disastrous consequences for the Constitution — and the country.”

Read it all. The Court of Appeals got it exactly right. There is a rule of law in this country, no matter what the President thinks.

RFSJ