Liberty Bell Silent

The United States was a revolutionary country determined to cast aside a distant, bureacratic, unfair justice system imposed upon it by the British. But, we have come full circle. Our courts, despite finding that the United States is holding three men from a Chinese minority in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, whom even the Bush Administration admits are neither enemy combatants, nor guilty of any crime, but would face persecution if returned to China, have held that the men are entitled to no legal remedy and must rot in a military prison camp.

This is a case where our traditions as a nation that respects human rights and as a nation of immigrants should inform justice. It is also a situation where the Pottery Barn rule applies. We broke it, we bought it. The United States government created this problem by bringing these men to territory control by the United States agains their will. It now has a responsibility to allow them to live here as refugees and to compensate them for the years of confinement that they have suffered wrongfully as a result of our actions.