Treaty on Torture
Re “Is There a Torturous Road to Justice?” Commentary, Nov. 8: I’m surprised law professor Alan Dershowitz thinks that extracting information by torture could be legal under U.S. law. He has evidently forgotten that we signed, ratified and executed the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
It provides: “No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability, or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.” Under the supremacy clause of the Constitution, treaties become part of our domestic law, not just international law, and their provisions can be enforced in U.S. courts.
Marjorie Cohn
Associate Professor
Thomas Jefferson School of Law
San Diego
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