[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 13421]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       GUANTANAMO HISTORY LESSON

  (Mr. PITTS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, in light of last week's Supreme Court 
decision giving enemy terrorist detainees at Guantanamo habeas corpus 
rights, I thought I would offer a brief history lesson as described by 
my friend Gary Bauer.
  On June 13, 1942, four armed German spies came ashore on the beaches 
of Long Island, New York. Four days later, four more spies came ashore 
at Jacksonville, Florida. All were sent to sabotage American defense 
sites. All eight were quickly captured, tried by military tribunal, not 
civilian courts. Less than a month later, their cases began, and by 
August 4, all were convicted.
  Sixty-six years later, almost to the day, the U.S. Supreme Court in a 
5-4 decision declared that foreign terrorists captured on foreign soil 
possess more rights under our Constitution than those Nazi spies sent 
here to ambush our domestic defenses.
  I believe history will no doubt judge that this flawed Supreme Court 
decision has left the United States less safe as a result.

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