Turning Over an Oak Leaf

And finding more absurdity underneath. Oak Leaf, one of the new STACLU contributors, has a post about a Senate committee that heard testimony from JAG corps officers about how to proceed after the Hamdan decision, based upon this article in the New York Times. He begins by invoking the TV show JAG, as though these military officers in the real JAG corps were just frivolous and shallow TV stars, not real military people (remember, you gotta support the troops - unless they disagree with you on something). By the way, these were not junior grade officers, these were the top lawyers from all four services, including one Brig. General and one Rear Admiral.

The four officers testified about the need for any military tribunals used to try detainees to conform to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, an important part of the Hamdan ruling. These officers have been at odds with the administration from the start in their insistence that we not substitute arbitrary star chamber proceedings for due process. Oak Leaf thinks that's a bad idea, but his reasoning is just plain silly:

I guarantee that a panel of Combat Arms Officers, who will have to follow these guidelines that you wish to make, will disagree with you completely!

Unlike the television series "JAG," never in the history of warfare, has an Officer assigned to the JAG Corp broken down a door or planned a raid to capture a terrorist. If the US Senate was serious, they would conduct Field Hearings in places like Ft. Stewart and Ft. Benning and take testimony from the men that will be breaking down those doors, conducting those raids and ultimately responsible for gathering "evidence.".

But this issue has nothing to do with what the men in the field do or don't do. This issue only has to do with how we will handle any legal proceedings we pursue against those who are captured. The combat soldiers should not change their actions in the slightest. HIs argument is like saying that we should just let the cops decide what to do with criminals. But that is precisely what our constitutional system does away with, allowing the same person to act as judge, jury and executioner.

The troops will continue to take into custody those they capture. But it's not up to them what will happen to them then, anymore than it's up to the cop on the beat to hold the trial and pass judgment on someone he arrests. That is the proper role of the courts and the courts are bound by the law. It was John Adams who coined the phrase "we are a nation of laws, not of men", which means that we are a nation which sets up clear standards by which we judge accused criminals and we do not jettison those standards whenever we feel like it. That's the difference between a republic and a dictatorship.