Guantanamo Watch

One of Obama's first acts as president was to issue a request to halt all prosecutions by military tribunal of Guantanamo prisoners. It is not quite an order--it has to be submitted as a motion by prosecutors to the judges operating the courts--but given executive control over the military, it should mean an immediate halt to prosecutions.

Given all the revelations of torture at Guantanamo (video reports here and here), this is the only manner in which Obama can ethically proceed. But reviewing military commissions and slowly considering policy can only be a start. The detainees might be tried by civilian courts in the United States. Or they may be quietly forgotten and then moved to shadow prisons in Afghanistan and elsewhere. Given the high likilihood that the American military is detaining a significant number of people who are neither enemies of America or a future threat (and, for that matter, not guilty of any wrongdoing that America could legally and morally seek to punish) this potential should shake lovers of constituional liberty and human rights.

It is somewhat disquieting that so much power remains in the hands of the executive in this matter. In that sense, at least, Obama's constitutional position is little changed from that of George W., who left office (seemingly) confident that he had done the right thing. For Obama to begin effecting true constitutional change, he will have to repudiate not merely the prison at Guantanamo, but the principles that allowed it.