Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Jan 18, 2006 Sen. Judiciary Committee

GONZALES: Well, sir, the fact that they may have talked about the constitutional right to habeas doesn’t mean that the decision dealt with that constitutional right to habeas.

SPECTER: When did you last read the case?

GONZALES: It has been a while, but I’ll be happy to — I will go back and look at it.

SPECTER: I looked at it yesterday and this morning again.

GONZALES: I will go back and look at it. The fact that the Constitution — again, there is no express grant of habeas in the Constitution. There is a prohibition against taking it away. But it’s never been the case, and I’m not a Supreme —

SPECTER: Now, wait a minute. Wait a minute. The constitution says you can’t take it away, except in the case of rebellion or invasion. Doesn’t that mean you have the right of habeas corpus, unless there is an invasion or rebellion?

GONZALES: I meant by that comment, the Constitution doesn’t say, “Every individual in the United States or every citizen is hereby granted or assured the right to habeas.” It doesn’t say that. It simply says the right of habeas corpus shall not be suspended except by —

Is there something I can add?

2 comments:

Zakariah Johnson said...

That's the man right there we have to thank for losing the hearts and minds campaign in Iraq. Rummy & Dick & Rice and the rest all deserve blame as well, but when it comes to totally undermining U.S. credibility nobody can touch Alberto "Abu Ghraib" Gonzales. The man is in a class by himself.

Anonymous said...

I wonder what else isn't specifically delineated as "granted." This POS can't seem to conceive of pre-existing.

Chuck,
gmail jsut hashed this