The release of nine Department of Justice memos written in the months following the 9/11 attacks, during the Bush presidency, shows the total contempt the government had for the Bill of Rights.

In an October 23, 2001 memo Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo and Special Counsel Robert J. Delahunty stated that not only could he military be used to arrest terrorists in the United States but that they did not have to comply with Fourth Amendment requirements regarding the use of search warrants. In a September 25, 2002 memo Yoo justified amending the law to allow warrantless searches in the United States to obtain intelligence.

Also in the October 23, 2001 memo Yoo stated that, “First Amendment speech and press rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war successfully,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo wrote, in another memo: “The current campaign against terrorism may require even broader exercises of federal power domestically.”

A cardinal rule of statutory interpretation is that when the language of the statute (or the Constitutional amendment) is clear the plain language supersedes other interpretations. The Fourth Amendment states:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

It has no exception for terrorists or for al-Qaeda or for the whims of George Bush and John Yoo. As Benjamin Franklin said,

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.

As Edward R. Morrow said,

We cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home

As Abraham Lincoln said,

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.

The memos point out the need for Senator Patrick Leahy’s Truth Commission. Such a commission would investigate torture, illegal wiretaps, and other violations of human rights.

For it is clear that if we violate our own rights we cannot cry when others violate rights.

The government, according to The Daily Five indicted Al Saleh Kahlah al-Marri for allegedly giving material support to Al Qaeda. Al-Marri, a native of Qatar was arrested in the United States and imprisoned on a naval brig for 5 1/2 years. The Bush administration considered him an enemy combatant and refused to try him. His detention and imprisonment without being charged is currently set to be heard by the Supreme Court next month. Perhaps it is to avoid a Supreme Court decision that the Obama administration indicted him in Illinois.

Al-Marri first came to the United States to attend Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. He graduated in 1991 and returned to Qatar. He came back to the United State on September 10, 2001 with his family to get a graduate degree from Bradley. He was arrested by the government and held as a material witness in the 9/11 attack. He was indicted on credit card charges and for lying to the FBI. In 1993 President Bush declared him a enemy combatant and transferred him to military custody. Since then he has been held in a military brig off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina.

“This indictment is an important step toward restoring the rule of law and is exactly what should happen when the government suspects an individual of terrorist acts,” ACLU lawyer Jonathan Hafetz who represents him. Attorney General Eric Holder is quoted in thge New Yorker as saying: “This indictment is an important step toward restoring the rule of law and is exactly what should happen when the government suspects an individual of terrorist acts,”

In al-Marri’s habeas matter the government is trying to avoid a decision which may apply to other enemy combatant who may be arrested in the future while legally in this country by moving to dismiss the case in the Supreme Court as moot. Al-Merri is the only enemy combatant currently housed in the United States or who was in this county legally at the time of his arrest.