[Non-Sequitur]

Bingo! But since that would have meant arresting Eleanor Roosevelt, Lillian Helman, etc., as well as other Rat party members and activists, Truman did nothing.

Would you rather he arrested William Taft, Thomas Dewey, Richard Nixon or prominent Republicans? How about arresting you?

Grant the president the right to jail 'traitors' without trial and you're leaving yourself at the mercy of his definition of just who a traitor is.

[BitBucket]

Grant the president the right to jail 'traitors' without trial and you're leaving yourself at the mercy of his definition of just who a traitor is.

I completely agree. But that is effectively what granting the President the authority to suspend habeas corpus does. That's why I can't agree that there is any ambiguity as to who has the power. The founders would not have allowed the executive to have that power.

[pierrem15]

Well, no I'm not. You seem to have accepted the left-wing notion that the protection of our liberties requires the removal of our intellects and big game of charades where we all pretend (especially the courts) that we don't know what giving aid and comfort to the enemy is.

The SCOTUS and the courts are not the ultimate guarantor of our liberties: we are, through the most effective check on the abuse of power-- elections. If the arrests had gone through, Truman would have been held accountable in '52, or even earlier through the impeachment system. If the threat had been deemed credible, then Truman would have likely suffered no penalty, just as Wilson did not during WWI.