Charles Skelton: “it is our obligation in this body to fix the deficiencies in this system in order to bring terrorists to justice. My…”

“it is our obligation in this body to fix the deficiencies in this system in order to bring terrorists to justice. My motion to recommit with instructions would add two important elements to the bill that address this basic concern. First, it would require an expedited constitutional review of the entire matter. That is what we need. Second, it would require reauthorization of these military commissions after 3 years. Expedited judicial review is a well-known way to improve legislation for which legal challenges can be anticipated, and we can be sure that the military commissions system created by this bill will be subject to change. We can provide for expedited review of civil actions challenging the legality of this act by creating a three-judge panel of the D.C. District Court that would hear the actions. The U.S. Supreme Court would then review a judgment or review an order of the panel on an expedited basis. This type of provision is routinely placed in novel legislation. It was part of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill, part of the Voting Rights Act, and part of the Communications Decency Act. The motion to recommit would also require that Congress reauthorize these military commissions after 3 years and would allow any action before a military commission begun before 2010 to go forward, but it would require an educated debate on reauthorizing this system after we have had some real-world experience with this new judicial process.”