Yesterday’s New York Times carried an interesting article about how more conservatives are joining libertarians and liberals in the defense of civil liberties. This is a remarkable development, one that threatens to split the conservative movement. For decades, conservatives have denigrated the importance of civil liberties, largely as part of the war on drugs, which both conservatives and liberals have waged for the past 30 years or so, without success and with much damage and destruction.
While conservatives have always paid the obligatory lip service to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights at their conferences and seminars, the sad truth is that they have deeply resented the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eight Amendments.
The principles enumerated in those amendments, conservatives have long maintained, are nothing more than legal technicalities intended to let guilty people get acquitted and be set free on the streets, able to commit more crime.
Indeed, if conservatives had their druthers, deep down they would like to see those particular amendments simply repealed or at least ignored.
In fact, that’s precisely why conservatives have supported the Pentagon’s prison camp and post-9/11 judicial system in Cuba for trying suspected terrorists. No right to counsel, no right to due process of law, no right to jury trial, no right to be free of torture, no right to be protected from forced self-incrimination, no exclusionary rule, no right to bail, no right to be protected from unreasonable searches, no right to confront witnesses, no right of habeas corpus, and no right to speedy trial.
Gitmo has been a conservative’s dream, one that many conservatives no doubt wished could be extended to drug offenses and other criminal cases.
On the other hand, libertarians and many (but far from all) liberals have aligned themselves on the side of civil liberties. Ever since our inception, here at FFF we have steadfastly emphasized the importance of civil liberties to a free society. In fact, the July 1990 issue of our journal Freedom Daily was entirely devoted to civil liberties.
The protections outlined in the Bill of Rights stretch all the way back to Magna Carta. While such protections sometimes result in the acquittal or release of people who have committed crimes, their primary purpose was to protect the innocent. As the old adage goes, better that ten guilty people go free than one innocent person be found guilty. America’s long history of protection of civil liberties has always been one of the hallmarks of American jurisprudence. It is something Americans should take great pride in.
Given the massive federal assault on civil liberties after 9/11, including the USA Patriot Act and the enemy-combatant doctrine, FFF has been at the forefront of defending civil liberties, especially through our two major conferences in 2007 and 2008: “Restoring the Republic: Foreign Policy and Civil Liberties,” which featured a combination of libertarian, liberal, and conservative speakers.
Now, according to the New York Times article, more conservatives are coming around and joining libertarians and liberals in the defense of civil liberties. As Norman L. Reimer, executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers states, “It’s a remarkable phenomenon. The left and right have bent to the point where they are now in agreement on many issues. In the area of criminal justice, the whole idea of less government, less intrusion, less regulation has taken hold.”
Will these new conservatives go all the way and embrace the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments as fervently as they embrace, say, the Second Amendment? Will they call for a repeal of the war on drugs, which is the greatest domestic excuse for trampling civil liberties? Will they call for an end to foreign wars and occupations, which engender the anger and rage that produces terrorist retaliation, which is then used as the excuse for suspending civil liberties? Will they support the Constitution’s use of federal courts for criminal offenses, including terrorism, rather than the extra-constitutional system with pre-ordained verdicts that the Pentagon has established?
It’s all possible but I would think it’s not very likely. Conservatives have gone too far down the road to omnipotent government when it comes to civil liberties. A sudden full-scale conversion to civil liberties might be too much to ask.
But the fact that more conservatives are now coming down somewhat in the defense of civil liberties and at least paying lip service to civil liberties is a very positive sign. At the very least, it might cause other conservatives to reevaluate their position and join up with us libertarians in the defense of not only economic liberty and gun rights (where conservatives tend to be good and liberals are horrible) but on civil liberties as well.