PUBLISHED BY GEORGETOWN LAW & SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AND COUNTERTERRORISM
Author Archive

William C. Banks

avatar Professor William C. Banks is an internationally recognized authority in national security law, counterterrorism, and constitutional law. Banks has helped set the parameters for the emerging field of national security law since 1987, co-authoring two leading texts in the field: National Security Law and Counterterrorism Law. In 2008, Banks was named the College of Law Board of Advisors Distinguished Professor at Syracuse University, where he has been a member of the faculty for over 30 years.


Educating National Security Lawyers for the Twenty-first Century: The Intersection of National Security Law and International Affairs

Educating National Security Lawyers for the Twenty-first Century: The Intersection of National Security Law and International Affairs

April 11, 2013 | 0 Comments | By and

Throughout its fifty-year history, the American Bar Association (ABA) Standing Committee on Law and National Security (SCOLANS) has strived to address the most important national security law issues and advance understanding among members of the bar and the public. In recent years, SCOLANS has recognized the importance of educating the next generation of lawyers to advise clients concerning [...]

Shadow Wars

Shadow Wars

January 24, 2012 | 0 Comments | By

Those of us who remember the 1980s lived through the Iran-Contra Affair and its labyrinth of arms-for-hostages deals, secret transfers of U.S. government funds, backdoor support for the Nicaraguan Contras after Congress cut off funding, and the duplicity of Reagan administration officials who tried to hide and then cover up what they were doing.

Introduction

Introduction

August 13, 2010 | 0 Comments | By and

For many of us, the cyber threat to U. S. national security is amorphous and not easy to comprehend. At the same time, in the last two years of the Bush administration and through the first year of the Obama presidency, cybersecurity has been characterized as “one of the most urgent national security problems facing the new administration.”

National Security Law Advice to the New Administration

National Security Law Advice to the New Administration

January 14, 2010 | 0 Comments | By

By any measure, the period between September 11, 2001, and the 2008 presidential election witnessed an unprecedented tangle of controversies at the intersection of national security law and policy.

Providing “Supplemental Security”– The Insurrection Act and the Military Role in Responding to Domestic Crises

Providing “Supplemental Security”– The Insurrection Act and the Military Role in Responding to Domestic Crises

December 15, 2009 | 0 Comments | By

It is well known that the American Revolution was spurred in large part by the colonists’ reaction to King George’s use of the military to enforce English laws in the colonies. After the colonists had become sufficiently disgruntled by the increasingly martial measures imposed by the King, the drafters of the Declaration of Independence listed among its central complaints the tendencies of the English Crown “to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.” Just as King Charles had been beheaded in 1649 for violating what became a fundamental Anglo- American value – that soldiers are respected for defeating enemies of the state but are never to be used against their civilian neighbors – King George lost the colonies when he employed troops to control disorderly civilians.