Enemy Combatants in War on Poverty Still Lawyer-less
By Joel Hagen
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Forty-two years after her arrest for being poor, Sadie White has slowly been allowed a few more privileges. She can now visit the courtyard at an undisclosed military facility for 30 minutes a day, giving her the chance to stretch her legs and check wounds received from the aggressive interrogation unit’s K-9s.
“They don’t allow lights in my cell,” she said. “They say I couldn’t afford lighting back home, so I shouldn’t have it here.”
White is one of the longest-held enemy combatants in our nation’s War on Poverty, which began with President Lyndon B. Johnson’s declaration on Jan. 8, 1964. A day later White was captured while trying to use food stamps to pay for her rent. She’s not alone. Over 30 million people today still live under poverty guidelines and are considered by many to be a waste of time and money to help. In White’s prison, over 1,500 unwed mothers and children have been held without trial and without access to lawyers for 40 years.
“They gave up their constitutional rights the moment they decided to be poor,” said White House Press Secretary Tony Snow. “The president has the authority to capture and detain individuals who join our enemies in the slums against America and its allies.”
Critics of the system claim that constitutional rights of access to the legal system should be granted to these prisoners.
“Many of these so-called combatants were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch. “In fact, we know of hundreds who were simply trying to pass out casseroles and canned peas in poverty stricken areas when they were detained indefinitely.”
Attorney Richard Samp is the chief counsel for the Washington Legal Foundation, an organization dedicated to keeping poor people from attaining legal representation.
“The U.S. has the right to detain enemy combatants who have been poor against us until the conclusion of the war, or the duration of hostilities. So long as poverty continues, there’s nothing wrong with holding people for the duration of the conflict,” he said.
White still hopes for more glimpses of daylight, and air free of urine odors.
“I’d also like to see my daughter someday before I die. I heard she’s here somewhere.”