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An Open Letter to My Fellow Citizens
Mark A. Goldman                                                                     Date: 5/3/04

May 3, 2004

Open Letter to My Fellow Citizens:

Terrorists are usually people who have no means other than by force to be heard in the political arena. The terrorist who attacked the United States on 9/11 (i.e., Assuming it was Osama bin Laden) promised to attack us because he believed that the United States was responsible for the great unjust suffering of hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women, and children. He probably knew and therefore believed that cries for justice from these innocent victims were never heard, even though every legal attempt to have them heard was pursued. He believes he had and does have a moral right and obligation to attack the United States in seeking justice, given that there is currently no other avenue of justice open to him or the victims he believes he represents. He might believe he has a legal right under international law as well.

I believe that if the United States and bin Laden were to have the opportunity to face off at an international tribunal made up of honorable and independent legal scholars who were free to adjudicate this case, absent all potential reprisals and political pressure, that bin Laden would possibly prevail and that the United States surely would not.

I believe that if there were a working international criminal court that was able to adjudicate Crimes against Peace and Crimes against Humanity, that various Presidents of the United States and others in high office would be held guilty and accountable for crimes committed and that the current President and several others in his administration would spend the rest of their lives in prison along with at least two other living Presidents and various officials who served with them.

Further, I believe that if the President and others serving in his administration would be impeached and tried as proscribed under the Constitution, and if members of Congress honored the values and intent specified therein, that the President and other members of his administration would be found guilty and removed from office.

Under Article VI of the United States Constitution it is held that Treaties signed by the United States become the Supreme Law of the Land. Article VI also holds that “…all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States” are obligated to support the Constitution and such treaties by virtue of the oath of office they take before assuming office. Failure to do so would presumably be sufficient cause for impeachment. The Supreme Court has since held that certain other agreements between or among nations have the same status as treaties do.

The charges against the named and unnamed defendants mentioned above include the following, which I am extracting from various sections of Francis A. Boyle’s brilliant book, “Destroying World Order:” (I am not a legal scholar but I am presenting my views according to my understanding of the law as I have so far exposed myself to it. What I am writing here has not been reviewed by anyone who would be considered a legal expert, although Professor Boyle is certainly widely recognized as such. He did not read, comment on, or approve this letter. Some conclusions that I drew from my readings are not necessarily anyone else's but my own.)

The charges I refer to include crimes or violations as defined by or specified by or under the following:
  1. Committing the international crime of genocide against the children of Iraq.
  2. Gross and consistent pattern of violations of basic human rights guaranteed the children of Iraq by The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child.
  3. The Nuremberg Crime Against Peace; The Nuremberg Crime Against Humanity, and The Nuremberg War Crimes.
  4. The Hague Regulations on Land Warfare of 1907.
  5. The Declaration of London on Sea Warfare of 1907.
  6. The Hague Draft Rules of Aerial Warfare of 1923.
  7. The Four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977.
  8. The International Crime of Genocide as defined by the International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948 and the United States’ own Genocide convention Implementation Act of 1987, 18 U.S.C. §1901.
  9. The Nuremberg Code on Medical Experimentation.
  10. Trying to suspend the Constitutional Writ of Habeas Corpus.
  11. Rounding up and incarcerating foreigners en masse.
  12. Establishing Kangaroo courts.
  13. Depriving at least two US Citizens of their constitutional rights by means of military incarceration.
  14. Interfering with the constitutional right of defendants in criminal cases to be represented by lawyers.
  15. Violating and subverting the Posse Comitatus Act.
  16. Conducting unlawful and unreasonable searches and seizures.
  17. Violating the first amendment rights of the free exercise of religion, freedom of speech, peaceable assembly, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances.
  18. Packing the federal judiciary with hand-picked judges belonging to the totalitarian Federalist Society and undermining the judicial independence of the Constitution’s Article III federal court system.
  19. Violating the US War Crimes Act.
  20. Violating the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
  21. Re-instituting or attempting to re-institute the infamous “Cointelpro” Program.
  22. Violating the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and the Covenant Against Torture.
  23. Instituting the totalitarian Total Information Awareness Program and establishing a totalitarian Northern Military Command for the United States of America itself.
  24. Violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution: US soldiers in the military service are overwhelmingly poor White, Black, and Latino and their military service is based on the coercion of a system that has denied viable economic opportunities to these classes of citizens.
  25. Violations of the U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956).
  26. The President had not received a Declaration of War by Congress when he declared that he would go to war regardless of the views of the American people. (No declaration of war was ever received, possibly because war by definition is conflict between nations only.  International law does provide for action against terrorists, but does not include the action taken by the United States.)
  27. Violation of Article 2(4) of the United National Charter, The Nuremberg Charter, Judgment and Principles, the Kellogg-Briand Pact, and numerous other international treaties and agreements.
  28. Threatening an act of war or carrying out an act of war against Iraq is not an act of self-defense under any established international law. In fact, such a theory has under international law been thoroughly discredited.

The purpose of this article is to introduce the reader to information that is vital to our Democracy and to world peace. This recitation of laws, treaties, and other standards or authorities that have been denigrated by this and other administrations is meant to be fair notice to each citizen that every one of us has an obligation and a duty to investigate the facts alluded to herein and if we find that the facts warrant it, that we take meaningful steps to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, indeed every world citizen. 

I personally am reporting that having read the charges above, as enumerated in various documents, and reviewed a good deal of substantiating documentation pertaining thereto, that I have formed a personal opinion that George W. Bush and other members of his administration deserve to be impeached and if found guilty of the charges made, ought to be removed from office. 

I believe that it is incumbent upon members of the House of Representatives to look into this matter and carry out their duty in an appropriate manner. Further, I believe that it is the duty of every citizen to do the same and to petition your representatives to do the job they promised they would do when they took their oath of office, assuming, of course, that you conclude after suitable research that such a petition is warranted.

Please forward this information to other citizens so that they might consider my findings and do their duty as they see fit.

Sincerely,

Mark A. Goldman
P.O. Box 1865
Vashon, WA  98070

References / links: 

www.citizensforimpeachingbush.com

Articles of Impeachment drafted by Ramsey Clark, 
former US Attorney General:
 http://votetoimpeach.org/articles_rc.htm

"In international legal terms, the Bush, Jr. administration should be
viewed as constituting an ongoing criminal conspiracy under 
international criminal law in violation of the Nuremberg Charter,
the Nuremberg Judgment, and the Nuremberg Principles, due
to its formulation and undertaking of war policies which are
legally akin to those perpetrated by the Nazi regime in pre-
World War II Germany."

Francis A. Boyle, Destroying World Order

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