Marjorie Cohn (born November 1, 1948) is a professor of law at the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, San Diego, California, and a former president of the National Lawyers Guild. In 1978 Cohn received a job in the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. She also “participated in delegations to Cuba, China, Russia, and Yugoslavia” early in her career.
Cohn has contributed online commentary criticizing the former Bush administration to web sites such as MWC News, AlterNet, CounterPunch, CommonDreams, After Downing Street, ZNet and Truthdig. She also states that she has been a commentator for the BBC, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, NPR and Pacifica Radio. In mid-2008, Cohn testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties concerning enhanced interrogation techniques (i.e. torture) and their legal status.
Marjorie on Drone Terrorism
Like torture, the use of targeted killing off the battlefield is illegal. Both practices are immoral as well. We have seen the atrocious program of torture conducted during the Bush administration. Drones flying overhead terrorize entire communities. They kill thousands of people. The U.S. government engages in “double taps,” in which those rescuing the wounded from the first strike are targeted. This practice should be called the “triple tap,” as mourners at funerals for those fallen by the drone bombs are also targeted.
Neither torture nor targeted killings makes us safer; in fact, they increase hatred against the United States. Professor Richard Falk discusses in his chapter on why drones are more dangerous than nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons have not been used since 1945 except for deterrence and coercive diplomacy. But drones are unconstrained by any system of regulation. 2014-12-24 Marjorie Cohn on Drone Warfare: Illegal, Immoral and Ineffective
Marjorie Cohn’s Statement on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
What does torture have in common with genocide, slavery, and wars of aggression?
They are all jus cogens. Jus cogens is Latin for “higher law” or “compelling law.” This
means that no country can ever pass a law that allows torture. There can be no immunity
from criminal liability for violation of a jus cogens prohibition.
The United States has always prohibited the use of torture in our Constitution, laws
executive statements and judicial decisions. We have ratified three treaties that all outlaw
torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. When the United
States ratifies a treaty, it becomes part of the Supreme Law of the Land under the
Supremacy Clause of the Constitution.
The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment, says, “No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a
threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked
as a justification for torture.”
Whether someone is a POW or not, he must always be treated humanely; there are no
gaps in the Geneva Conventions. He must be protected against torture, mutilation, cruel
treatment, and outrages upon personal dignity, particularly humiliating and degrading
treatment under, Common Article 3. In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court rejected
the Bush administration’s argument that Common Article 3 doesn’t cover the prisoners at
Guantánamo. Justice Kennedy wrote that violations of Common Article 3 are war
crimes. We have federal laws that criminalize torture.
The War Crimes Act punishes any grave breach of the Geneva Conventions, as well as
any violation of Common Article 3. That includes torture, willfully causing great
suffering or serious injury to body or health, and inhuman, humiliating or degrading
treatment.
The Torture Statute provides for life in prison, or even the death penalty if the victim
dies, for anyone who commits, attempts, or conspires to commit torture outside the
United States. 2008-05-06 Testimony of Marjorie Cohn before the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties House Judiciary Committee
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Book – Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues November 14, 2014 The Bush administration detained and tortured suspected terrorists; the Obama administration assassinates them. Assassination, or targeted killing, off the battlefield not only causes more resentment against the United States, it is also illegal. In this interdisciplinary collection, human rights and political activists, policy analysts, lawyers and legal scholars, a philosopher, a journalist, and a sociologist examine different aspects of the U.S. policy of targeted killing with drones and other methods. It explores the legality, morality and geopolitical considerations of targeted killing and resulting civilian casualties, and evaluates the impact on relations between the United States and affected countries.
Book – The United States and Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration, and Abuse January 12, 2011 Waterboarding. Sleep deprivation. Sensory manipulation. Stress positions. Over the last several years, these and other methods of torture have become garden variety words for practically anyone who reads about current events in a newspaper or blog. We know exactly what they are, how to administer them, and, disturbingly, that they were secretly authorized by the Bush Administration in its efforts to extract information from people detained in its war on terror. What we lack, however, is a larger lens through which to view America’s policy of torture — one that dissects America’s long relationship with interrogation and torture, which roots back to the 1950s and has been applied, mostly in secret, to “enemies,” ever since. How did America come to embrace this practice so fully, and how was it justified from a moral, legal, and psychological perspective?
Book – Rules of Disengagement April 1, 2009 Rules of Disengagement examines the reasons men and women in the military have disobeyed orders and resisted the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It takes readers into the courtroom where sailors, soldiers, and Marines have argued that these wars are illegal under international law and unconstitutional under US law. Through the voices of active duty service members and veterans, it explores the growing conviction among our troops that the wars are wrong.
Book – Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law June 28, 2007
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2023-10-02 Right-Dominated Supreme Court Is Poised to Do Grave Harm in Upcoming Term
2016-07-01 Marjorie Cohn – Killer Drones: Immoral, Illegal, Unwise
2014-12-30 Marjorie Cohn on Drone Warfare: Illegal, Immoral and Ineffective
2014-12-24 Marjorie Cohn on Drone Warfare: Illegal, Immoral and Ineffective
2014-12-23 Marjorie Cohn on Drone Warfare: Illegal, Immoral and Ineffective
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Drone Assassination Program
Drone Activists
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