自由、酷刑与定时炸弹理论Liberalism, Torture, and the Ticking Bomb.pdfVIP

DAVID LUBAN LIBERALISM, TORTURE, AND THE TICKING BOMB Torture used to be incompatible with American values. Our Bill of Rights forbids cruel and unusual punishment, and that has come to include all forms of corporal punishment except prison and death by methods pur- ported to be painless. Americans and our government condemn states that torture; we grant asylum or refuge to those who fear it. The Senate ratified the Convention Against Torture, Congress enacted antitorture legislation, and judicial opinions spoke of “the dastardly and totally inhuman act of torture.”1 Then came September 11. Less than a week later, a feature story reported that a quiz in a university ethics class “gave four choices for the proper U.S. response to the terrorist attacks: A.) execute the perpetrators on sight; B.) bring them back for trial in the U.S.; C.) subject the perpe- trators to an international tribunal; or D.) torture and interrogate those involved.” Most students chose A and D – execute them on sight and torture them.2 Six weeks after September 11, the New York Times reported that torture had become a topic of conversation “in bars, on commuter trains, and at dinner tables.”3 By mid-November 2001, the Christian Science Monitor found that one in three surveyed Americans favored torturing terror suspects.4 American abhorrence to torture now appears to have extraordinarily shallow roots. To an important extent, one’s stance on torture runs independent of progressive or conservative ideology. Alan Dershowitz would permit torture, provided it is regulated by a judicial warrant requirement;5 and liberal senator Charles Schumer has publicly poo-poo-ed the idea “that torture should never, ever be used.”6 He argues that every US senator would back torture to find out where a ticking time bomb is planted.