Crypto Terrorists to be Tried in Military Tribunal

Greg Broiles gbroiles at parrhesia.com
Sun Nov 18 23:07:14 PST 2001


At 11:14 PM 11/18/2001 -0500, Peter Capelli wrote:
>Okay, here's a question from a 'stupid fuck'; Did *you* read the order?
>Check out Section 7 (a) (3):
>
>Sec. 7.  Relationship to Other Law and Forums.
>
>(a)  Nothing in this order shall be construed to --
>
>(1)  authorize the disclosure of state secrets to any person not otherwise
>authorized to have access to them;
>(2)  limit the authority of the President as Commander in Chief of the Armed
>Forces or the power of the President to grant reprieves and pardons; or
>
>(3)  limit the lawful authority of the Secretary of Defense, any military
>commander, or any other officer or agent of the United States or of any
>State to detain or try any person who is not an individual subject to this
>order.
>
>
>Now I am not a lawyer, but doesn't that mean that this can be applied to
>anyone?

No, it means it's not meant to alter people's pre-existing status vis-a-vis 
detentions or trials; if they didn't include a clause like that, then 
people would argue that the executive order didn't just add to existing 
law, but replaced it, such that previously possible prosecutions would no 
longer be possible since they weren't explicitly permitted in the EO.

The crucial language is "limit the lawful authority", where the scope of 
the pre-existing "lawful authority" may be tiny or nonexistent. It's not 
correct to assume that there's (necessarily) any such lawful authority, 
absent other facts (like a declaration of martial law, or a person's status 
as a member of the military, etc.)


--
Greg Broiles -- gbroiles at parrhesia.com -- PGP 0x26E4488c or 0x94245961
5000 dead in NYC? National tragedy.
1000 detained incommunicado without trial, expanded surveillance? National 
disgrace.





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