Home » Salem Award Media » News Article
Guantanamo Lawyers Win Salem Award
- The Salem News (April 4, 2007)
- By Tom Dalton, Staff Writer
SALEM – Two lawyers who dealt a serious setback to the Bush administration's efforts to prosecute terror suspects at the military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, will receive the Salem Award for Human Rights and Social Justice.
Navy Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift and Georgetown law professor Neal Katyal, who last year took their legal fight to the Supreme Court and won, are the recipients of the 15th annual award, which will be presented June 1 at the Peabody Essex Museum. Each will receive a $5,000 cash prize.
"I was flabbergasted when I got the call," Katyal said. "I said to my mom last week, 'This is the greatest honor I could possibly get.'"
Katyal, the John Carroll professor of law at Georgetown University, led the legal challenge to the constitutionality of the military commissions established at Guantanamo to try detainees as was criminals in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He testified before Congress, filed the original legal briefs and later argued the case before the Supreme Court.
"The history of what happened (in Salem) is what's been motivating me to do what I've been doing, which is not to fight for terrorists to go free, but to say we want a fair trial," Katyal said yesterday in a telephone interview from his office in Washington, D.C. "And if there is a quintessential American event that crystallizes that basic promise, it is what happened at Salem."
Swift, the Navy lawyer, called the Salem Award an "extraordinary honor." "I applaud Salem for taking a dark point of history and trying to hold it up as an example and reminder for people to be vigilant, because it starts small, and, before you know it, it gets out of hand."
The Salem Award honors present-day champions of human rights as a reminder of the lessons of the witch trials of 1692, when 20 citizens were executed in a witch hysteria.
"We're really excited about these award recipients," said Kate Murray, chairwoman of The Salem Award Foundation. "The more that the case was explained to us, the more that it seemed to parallel what was going on during the time of the Salem witch trials."
Upholding the Geneva Convention
The two lawyers represented Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a former driver for Osama bin Laden who was captured in 2001 following the U.S. attack on Afghanistan. He was accused of conspiracy and being a member of al-Qaida and was held at Guantanamo as a war criminal, where he remains. Hamdan claimed he was not a terrorist and was fleeing Afghanistan when he was captured.
Swift, a Navy Judge Advocate General officer, challenged the legality of the military commissions, which initially offered him access to his client only when he negotiated a guilty plea. He became so involved in the case that he traveled to his client's homeland of Yemen and arranged secret meetings with former al-Qaida members.
Katyal, a former law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, spent two years defending Hamdan and more than $40,000 of his own money.
In a 5-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled last year that the military tribunals were illegal, that they denied the detainees' basic legal rights and violated the Geneva Convention.
"This case is not about my client avoiding justice," Swift said after the ruling was announced. "It's about what form of justice he should face."
This is the first time in the history of the Salem Award that there are two recipients. The 19-member committee felt both men were living examples of the lessons of the witch trials and equally deserving.
"In both cases (Salem and Guantanamo), most people stood by and did nothing, but the two award recipients did not do that," said William Cornwell, assistant professor of philosophy at Salem State College and a member of the committee. "I just have tremendous respect for both of them."
Reprinted with permission from The Salem News.