United States
Main article: Military tribunals in the United States See also: Judge Advocate General's CorpsThe United States Constitution authorized the creation of a system of military justice. Article I, Section 8 permits the U.S. Congress to "make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces." Congress issued these rules first in 1806 as the Articles of War. Military justice during the American Civil War was governed by the 1863 Lieber Code. The Articles of War were superseded in 1951 by the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).
The UCMJ is federal law, found in Title 10 United States Code Chapter 47, and implemented by the Manual for Courts-Martial, an executive order issued by the President of the United States in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief of the United States armed forces. Court-martial convictions in the United States may be appealed through miltary courts of appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF), a federal appellate court consisting of five civilian judges appointed by the President of the United States. CAAF decisions are subject to direct view by the Supreme Court of the United States.
The offenses covered by the UCMJ include those encompassed by "high crimes and misdemeanors" which covers officials generally, and includes perjury of oath, abuse of authority, bribery, intimidation, misuse of assets, failure to supervise, dereliction of duty, conduct unbecoming, and refusal to obey a lawful order. It also includes ordinary crimes, but perhaps with different standards of proof and punishment than for civilians, on the grounds that more is expected of military personnel by their oaths of office. Many of the terms used date back to that era of law.
Read more about this topic: Military Justice
Famous quotes related to united states:
“In the United States, though power corrupts, the expectation of power paralyzes.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)
“... the yearly expenses of the existing religious system ... exceed in these United States twenty millions of dollars. Twenty millions! For teaching what? Things unseen and causes unknown!... Twenty millions would more than suffice to make us wise; and alas! do they not more than suffice to make us foolish?”
—Frances Wright (1795–1852)
“We now in the United States have more security guards for the rich than we have police services for the poor districts. If you’re looking for personal security, far better to move to the suburbs than to pay taxes in New York.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)
“What lies behind facts like these: that so recently one could not have said Scott was not perfect without earning at least sorrowful disapproval; that a year after the Gang of Four were perfect, they were villains; that in the fifties in the United States a nothing-man called McCarthy was able to intimidate and terrorise sane and sensible people, but that in the sixties young people summoned before similar committees simply laughed.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“The United States is unusual among the industrial democracies in the rigidity of the system of ideological control—’indoctrination’ we might say—exercised through the mass media.”
—Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)