On June 12, 2008, in the case of Boumediene v. Bush, Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion for the 5-4 majority holding that Guantanamo Bay prisoners had a right to the habeas corpus under the United States Constitution and that the Military Commissions Act (Section 7 - 2005) was an unconstitutional suspension of that right.
This is a victory for human rights and renewal of faith in the American Justice System.
Guantanamo Bay has been at the center of a legal battle since 2002 when it was first used for detainees in the "War on Terrorism." The first battle against bush by illegally held detainees was won in 2004, with Rasul v. Bush, when the Supreme Court decided that they do indeed have jurisdiction in Guantanamo Bay and that the detainees do in fact have a right to file a writ of habeas corpus.
This is also in line with the Geneva Convention, which was designed to cover all types of "combatants" whether they were official POW's or "unlawful combatants." The distinction was that POW's would get specific rights while detained as outlined in the Third Geneva Convention but that "unlawful combatants" who were detained in a country foreign to them, would at least have access to the local justice system for addressing their rights to habeas corpus, among other things.
The International Committee of the Red Cross was quoted in the Supreme Court's 2004 decision for Rasul v. Bush in 2004:
Every person in enemy hands must be either a prisoner of war and, as such, be covered by the Third Convention; or a civilian covered by the Fourth Convention. Furthermore, "There is no intermediate status; nobody in enemy hands can be outside the law," because in the opinion of the ICRC "If civilians directly engage in hostilities, they are considered 'unlawful' or 'unprivileged' combatants or belligerents (the treaties of humanitarian law do not expressly contain these terms). They may be prosecuted under the domestic law of the detaining state for such action".
It is obvious to anyone with even a fractional reserve of brain cells, that the Bush Administration used the location of Guantanamo Bay specifically in hopes of suspending the detainees rights under the Geneva Conventions and any rights they may have had on U.S. soil.
After losing the earlier court battle in 2004, the Bush Administration created the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 and the Military Commissions Act of 2006, in hopes of establishing a chimera of justice for the detainees, while still attempting to circumvent Geneva.
In the most recent Supreme Court decision against Bush, the newly created Military Commissions Act (section 7 only) was struck down as unconstitutional because the court found they were "inadequate" based on the fact that detainees cannot know the full charges against them, often had no counsel, were not allowed to present witnesses or cross-examine government witnesses, and detainees could be convicted by hearsay alone.
The Supreme Court received over two dozen briefs of amicus curiae on the case, including some written strictly on the history and application of Habeas Corpus in England, Scotland, Hanover, Ireland, Canada, British-controlled territories, India, and the United States. Twenty-two amicus briefs were filed in support of the petitioners, Messrs. Boumediene and Al Odah, and four were filed in support of the respondents, the Bush Administration.
Several other cases were amalgamated with Boumediene in this decision.
For more background on these and related legal proceedings:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boumediene_v._Bush
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Odah_v._United_States
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasul_v._Bush
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamdi_v._Rumsfeld
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combatant_ ... w_Tribunal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detainee_Treatment_Act
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_C ... ct_of_2006
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combatant_ ... w_Tribunal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_corpus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo ... nment_camp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unlawful_combatant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawful_combatant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enemy_combatant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POW
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_terrorism
The final link there about the "definition of terrorism" is a thought provoking article.
The success for human rights upheld by the Supreme Court in U.S. Law is inspiring in that even in the face of terrorism, the United States law can be shown to work, even for suspected terrorists in a political climate of retribution. The Executive Branch of the United States government is not above the law and cannot circumvent it, even for suspected terrorists. We should all breathe a sigh of relief that Habeas Corpus has been upheld, a real victory for humanity since the inception of Habeas Corpus when it was first codified in the Magna Carta 1215.
