Boumediene v. Bush

Introduction

After a long wait, Algerian Lakhdar Boumediene, arrested in Bosnia in 2001 and imprisoned since 2002 in the concentration camp at Guantanamo, has won a major legal battle against the president of the United States, George W. Bush.

The proceedings brought by Lakhdar Boumediene, without solving all problems, is a legal victory, late but important for all Guantanamo detainees. It's by five votes against four judges of the U.S. Supreme Court has authorized, Thursday, the 270 detainees at Guantanamo Gulag to enter civil justice, to challenge their detention.

The judges, by a narrow majority, held that the U.S. Constitution applies to Guantanamo. Although it is expected that the administration committed a procedural battle, the judgment is a monumental denial for George W. Bush.

What the Supreme Court has issued a recall is essential, that the fight against terrorism does not justify the laws and Constitution that are put under a bushel. The U.S. Supreme Court been consistent in this area, despite the presence of conservative judges totally committed to Bush.

Twice in the past, it had issued a judgment from the same direction, but Congress, then dominated by supporters of Bush, voted for new legislation to allow preservation of Guantanamo and the establishment of courses special military to try detainees classified as "enemy combatants", a legal barbarism to avoid the implementation of international conventions. It is these laws that are challenged by the judgment.

Issues at Stake and Claims

The September 11 terrorist attacks prompted a global military conflict that has produced numerous troubling dilemmas for the legal community. Since 2001, U.S. forces around the world have targeted and killed suspected terrorists as part of the "Global War on Terror" (GWOT), pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) (Boumediene and Bush et al, 2007)They have also captured and detained hundreds of others. Unsurprisingly, many detainees have attempted to obtain relief in the federal courts. As a result, the courts have been faced with the serious question of whether these detainees, who are predominantly noncitizens, captured and held in facilities outside the United States, can challenge their detention by petitioning for writs of habeas corpus.

The Boumediene petitioners were all foreign nationals captured abroad, deemed enemy combatants, and held at Guantanamo. "Guantanamo Bay is not formally part of the United States. And under the terms of the lease between the United States and Cuba, Cuba retains 'ultimate sovereignty' over the territory while the United States exercises 'completes jurisdiction and control.'"(Boumediene and Bush et al, 2007)While the Court conceded that the United States lacks de jure sovereignty, it concluded that "the United States . . . maintains de facto sovereignty over th[e] territory" (Hamilton, 2007). The Court explicitly rejected the government's argument that "de jure sovereignty is the touchstone of habeas corpus jurisdiction." (Military Commissions Act , 2006)

The Court noted that although the Eisentrager petitioners were ultimately denied access to the writ, Eisentrager had carefully considered the practical implications involved in applying the writ extraterritorially, going beyond a simple determination about the United ...