The Constitutional Review Of American Anti-terrorism Legislation

The United States launched the "war on terror" after the9.11terror attacks, making Congressional Legislation and Executive Orders constitute the dualistic anti-terrorism mechanisms which pose grave threat to the Checks and Balances as well as the protection of Human Rights. The Federal Supreme Court is deemed as significant guardian of separation of powers in the American constitutional system by using the power of judicial review to restrict the Congress and the Government. The Federal Supreme Court has passed several judgments since2001which make unconstitutional anti-terrorism legislations and measures revised, shifting the focus of the counterterrorism from upholding national security to protect basic human rights as well as call the national policy for a return to constitutional order. Based on historical context, this paper adopts the methods of case analysis and constitutional interpretation to analyze Habeas Corpus cases after "9.11" attack at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, interpreting checks and balances of western countries for reference of our anti-terrorism legislation and practice work.This paper mainly consists of five parts. The first chapter is introduction, mainly introducing the research status at home and abroad, the significance as well as the methods of the research. Terrorism and American anti-terrorism legislation review in chapter two mainly introduces the origin, classification, causes of terrorism as well as its definition in the legal dimension. By teasing out American anti-terrorism legislation after the9.11terror attacks, we can point out that legislations about armed attack and national security enacting by the congress and the government break the balance of "the power and the right". The third chapter-Constitutionality control by the U.S. Supreme Court over American anti-terrorism legislation--is the key chapter of this paper, mainly introducing a series of trials referring to habeas corpus at Guantanamo bay naval base, which include the cases of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, Rasul v. Bush and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. The analysis ranges over three aspects--case facts, court verdict and influence of judgment. The core parts of this paper are chapter three, chapter four and chapter five, mainly introducing U.S. Supreme Court’s trial situation of Habeas Corpus cases after "9.11" attack at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. This paper selected three typical cases, namely the cases of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, Rasul v. Bush and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, respectively from the case review, analysis of cfa, judgment influence three aspects to analyze, in order to make a further explanation of issues of the presidential power’s boundary, federal court jurisdiction scope and the constitutionality of the military commission trial.