More Legalism, This Time in Canada

Canada's public safety minister spoke out today against the legalistic efforts to cripple anti-terror measures.  

he fears for the government's ability to fight terrorism in light of "an increasingly complex legal environment" in which judges are no longer deferring to the government in its efforts to deport foreign suspects.

Instead of taking precautions against suspicious foreigners, new interference by the courts grants extensive rights to alien suspects, preventing the government from taking action to protect national security.

We see that same attitude here in the U.S. among terrorist rights supporters. It rests on what I consider the false notion that the rights of a state should also extend to foreign residents, in defiance of both traditional practice and common sense. One of the principal roles of government is to act against foreign threats, and to protect the security of the nation and its people. Non-citizens present in a state are there, or should be there, at the pleasure of the host state. In a situation in which a non-citizen is suspected of being a threat, the state should err on the side of protecting its own citizens, not the alien. The idea that a judge can block the government from deporting a non-citizen deemed to be a threat, perverts the role of government and places the interests of an alien above the interests of the citizens it is supposed to serve.