Critical Senate Vote on Habeas Corpus

Tell Your Senators: Vote Yes to Restore Habeas Corpus Restore Habeas Corpus

This week, the Senate will hold its first up-or-down vote on restoring habeas corpus. Tell your Senators to support the Specter-Leahy amendment to the Department of Defense Authorization bill.


For the last several months, Working Assets members have been leading the fight to restore habeas corpus. We worked hard to ensure that legislation passed the Senate Judiciary committee by holding meetings with key senators. This week, the first up-or-down vote on restoring this critical right will occur in the Senate -- and your voice can make a difference.

Tell your Senators that it is time to save habeas corpus and restore our Constitution.

In September 2006, Congress passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA), which stripped the right of habeas corpus for the first time since the Civil War. Habeas corpus is a fundamental right common to all modern legal systems, which requires independent judicial review of charges brought by the executive branch. But the passage of MCA has allowed the Bush administration to hold "detainees" at Guantanamo indefinitely -- without any explanation for their imprisonment.


Click here to let your Senators know you want to see habeas corpus restored.

Indefinite detention is simply unconstitutional, and does not reflect American values. On June 7th, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to take the first step to restore habeas corpus by approving the "Habeas Corpus Restoration Act of 2007" (S. 185), sponsored by Senators Leahy and Specter. Today, the Senate is starting debate on the Defense Authorization bill, and S. 185 will be offered as an amendment.

Without habeas corpus, it's a very slippery slope towards dictatorship.

So click here to ask your Senators to vote yes on the Leahy-Specter habeas amendment; we'll send a copy of your letter to your representative as well.

Please share this message with anyone you know who cares about restoring habeas corpus.

Thank you for working to build a better world.

Will Easton, Manager
ActForChange.com/Working Assets

A President, or a King?

"There is nothing 'conservative' or 'tough on terrorism' in selectively stripping people of their rights." – New York Times editorial

Dear Friends of the Heart,
Congress gave away one of the oldest Constitutional rights. Tell them to take it back.

Congress made a terrible mistake last October, and allowed president bush to damage one of the oldest founding principles of our democracy. They gave the President the authority to seize people and hold them without ever explaining why – despite the fact that the Constitution itself says he should not have that power.

Now some members of the House have recognized how big a deal this is, and they're trying to set it right. Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) is beginning a fight to restore the right of habeas corpus, which Congress gave away.

Tell your Representative to Restore our Constitutional rights to habeas corpus.
http://action.truemajority.org/campaign/habeas_corpus

Maybe it sounds like a legal technicality, but the habeas corpus right is pretty simple, and pretty important. It is "the right of anyone who’s tossed in prison to appear in court and say 'Hey, why am I in prison?'."1

Without that right, people get thrown into places like Guantanamo Bay for years with no evidence other than the say-so of a bounty hunter collecting his $5,000 fee.2 And legal experts say that the law is written so that anyone, U.S. citizen or not, could get that treatment if she acts against the president.3

It's hard to write about even the basic facts here without sounding overly-dramatic, but this is how it is. One of the reasons that we fought the Revolution was so that a king could not imprison people without a court hearing. Taking away that right is not protecting America; it's dismantling it.

Congressman Nadler is trying to add language to an existing bill which would restore habeas corpus. If that fails, he promises to bring it up again, as an amendment. If that fails, there are new bills waiting which would undo the damage of last October's "Military Commissions Act." Send your message now to tell your Representatives to do what it takes to restore this cornerstone of American democracy.

Matt Holland
TrueMajorityACTION Online Director

1 - The death of habeas corpus - MSNBC.com
2 - The Shame of Guantanamo – Washington Post Writers Group
3 - Challenging the Military Commissions Act, Jurist, October 04, 2006
For More Information:
Article I, Section 9, Clause 2 of the Constitution of the United States:

“The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.”

Who's Really Locked up in Guantanamo?

Here's the message we'll send to your Representative:
The right of habeas corpus is one of the oldest founding principles of our democracy – the right of someone held by the government to ask why she has been seized. The Military Commissions Act cancelled that right, and I insist that Congress restore it. I urge you to support efforts by Rep. Nadler to add language which does that into the Defense Authorization bill, and also to back bills such as the Habeas Restoration Act.

If you received this message from a friend, you can sign up for TrueMajorityACTION. TrueMajorityACTION.org is a grassroots group of citizens who believe in America's true values of openness, fairness and compassion. We believe participating in an effective government is the best way to be mutually responsible for our community.