Suspending Habeas Corpus

So I'm working on a paper on, well, suspending habeas corpus, and to that end I've been reading After: How America Confronted the September 12 World, by Steven Brill (Simon & Schuster 2003). Brill reports that in the Justice Department's first draft of legislation after September 11 (we're talking the September 17 draft of what eventually became the USA PATRIOT Act), the suspension of habeas corpus was proposed as part of the government's "wish list."

Page 74: "Most shocking was that the bill suspended . . . habeas corpus . . . . Ashcroft was proposing that it just plain be eliminated during this undefined emergency that had no designated end date."

Chair of House Judiciary, James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisc.), quickly put the kaibosh on this proposal, calling it a nonstarter.

The interesting part is the footnote on page 74. Brill notes that neither Ashcroft nor Viet Dinh, his deputy at that time, would confirm this fact for the book, but that Sensenbrenner and White House officials recalled the suspension as part of the draft. (I guess Brill did not himself have access to the draft, because that would clear the matter up, right away.) Brill quotes Ashcroft as saying 'he could not 'reconstruct with any accuracy' whether the suspension of habeas corpus was proposed." What a weasel-ly answer that is. You don't remember proposing the suspension of habeas corpus? Really?

I'm not a very big fan of Sensenbrenner, but he got this one right, as did unnamed White House officials.