October 12, 2007

Who Killed Habeas?

"I" said the Meadowlark, "In my prison in the dark, I killed Habeas." Dating back over 700 years in the English speaking world, the notion that the custodian of a prisoner must justify their detention before a court lays the foundation for individual liberty. Without habeas corpus the state becomes all-powerful, whether that power be fully exercised, or not. To better understand what's happening in the so-called "war on terror," and where things are headed, I turned to Joseph Margulies, law professor at Northwestern, lead attorney in Rasul, and author of Guantánamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power. Joe is more charitable than I am towards the government but he has a very sensible understanding of how the habeas cases are playing out. And he's been doing yeoman work in the trenches. It was very kind of him to talk with me and I learned a great deal. Total runtime here an hour and fourteen minutes. Listen, and think!