Legal Lines in Shifting Sand: Immigration Law and Human Rights in the Wake of September 11th

Abstract

In March of 2004, a group of legal scholars gathered at Boston College Law School to examine the doctrinal implications of the events of September 11, 2001. They reconsidered the lines drawn between citizens and noncitizens, war and peace, the civil and criminal systems, as well as the U.S. territorial line. Participants responded to the proposition that certain entrenched historical matrices no longer adequately answer the complex questions raised in the “war on terror.” They examined the importance of government disclosure and the public’s right to know; the deportation system’s habeas corpus practices; racial profiling; the convergence of immigration and criminal law since the attacks; judicial review of military detentions at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere; and noncitizens’ rights in the United States and the European Union. From their insights have emerged an outline for future research and the seeds of a pragmatic legal approach to these increasingly complex questions, all grounded in a deep respect for human rights.