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News :: Miscellaneous |
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POSSE COMITATUS REVISITED |
Current rating: 0 |
by Steven Aftergood, Secrecy News
(No verified email address) |
14 Dec 2001
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The one thing that USED to set the U.S. apart from the military dictatorships we often support was the fact that the military didn't patrol the streets of our towns, involved in pollice work. |
The emerging role of the military in "homeland security" is a delicate matter because it impinges on the traditional separation between civilian and military affairs that is a hallmark of American governance.
That separation is enshrined, for example, in the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits the use of military forces in civilian law enforcement.
Now, in the 2002 Defense Authorization Act, Congress has directed the Secretary of Defense to "conduct a study on the appropriate role of the Department of Defense with respect to homeland security":
http://www.fas.org/sgp/congress/2001/homesec.html
In an October 12 letter, Senator John Warner invited the Pentagon to propose modifications to the Posse Comitatus Act. "Limited use [of military forces] beyond that permitted by existing law might strengthen the nation's ability both to protect against and to respond to events of the sort which we have recently undergone," wrote Warner.
The meaning and implications of the Posse Comitatus Act were examined with rigor and clarity in a 1997 law review article by Matthew Carlton Hammond in the Washington University Law Quarterly, available here:
http://law.wustl.edu/WULQ/75-2/752-10.html
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