Mr. President, you said that torture “works” and that you would “allow” waterboarding as a form of interrogation methods towards individuals who are considered “terrorists.” According to various definitions, torture is applied to a prisoner or detained individual to obtain a confession or admission of a crime, or simply to impose pain and suffering as a punishment. I would like to say that any form of torture is immoral for any individual to have to go through, especially within interrogation. In the Eighth amendment of the United States Constitution it states that “cruel and unusual punishment shall not be inflicted…” Above all, it is a deliberate and intentional method to break someone either physically and psychologically in order to obtain information. The cruel and unusual punishment clause in the eighth amendment prohibits the federal and state governments from imposing certain punishments, regardless of the crime committed. Although, the Amendment does not specifically define punishments to be considered cruel and unusual, case laws throughout U.S. history has deemed such punishments as castration, burning alive, drawing and quartering, public dissection, and any punishment designed to cause a lingering death, to be beyond the concept of public decency, and therefore cruel and unusual. …show more content…
The detainees were not barred from seeking habeas or invoking the Suspension Clause merely because they had been designated as enemy combatants or held at Guantanamo