The U.S. Constitution offers protection to non-Americans

A post I wrote last week ("Guantanamo detainee dies in custody") has elicited a vigorous and heated interchange in the Comments section.  I normally leave comment debates alone as long as they don't deteriorate into interpersonal "ad hominem" attacks, but one comment that was made today warrants rebuttal:

"Constitutional right? He's a terrorist, NOT an American citizen, he has NO Constitutional right"

That's wrong.  Ethically wrong - AND Constitutionally wrong.  Here's a repost of an article I posted one year ago:

Selections from another interesting essay by Glenn Greenwald at Salon:

...one of the most pervasive myths in our political discourse: namely, that the U.S. Constitution protects only American citizens, and not any dreaded foreigners...

First, the U.S. Supreme Court, in 2008, issued a highly publicized opinion, in Boumediene v. Bush... although the decision was 5-4, none of the 9 Justices -- and, indeed, not even the Bush administration -- argued that the Constitution applies only to American citizens. What divided the Boumediene Court was the question of whether foreigners held by the U.S. military outside of the U.S. (as opposed to inside the U.S.) enjoy Constitutional protections...

Indeed, the whole reason why Guantanamo was created was that Bush officials wanted to claim that the Constitution is inapplicable to foreigners held outside the U.S. -- not even the Bush administration would claim that the Constitution is inapplicable to foreigners generally.

The principle that the Constitution applies not only to Americans, but also to foreigners, was hardly invented by the Court in 2008. To the contrary, the Supreme Court -- all the way back in 1886 -- explicitly held this to be the case... Over 100 years ago, the Supreme Court explicitly said that the rights of the Constitution extend to citizens and foreigners alike. The Court has repeatedly applied that principle over and over.