Broomstick wrote:Back before Roe v. Wade, when the majority of US states outlawed abortion to one degree or another and considered illegal abortion to be first degree murder, it was a common practice for women who could afford to do so to travel to a state where abrotion was legal and have one performed -- because even though the act was considered murder in their state of residence it was NOT murder where the deed was done and therefore they could not be prosecuted for it. Which is precisely why the anti-abortion groups in the US want a constitutional amendment to outlaw it, because that is the only way to guarantee that no one in the US can legally obtain one. If you left it up to the states you'd have a patchwork of abortion/no abortion states, just like before.
This is significantly different from stuff like pedophilia, because there is by no means any sort of major unified consensus on the status of the embryo, and there are other issues at play, which you as a supporter of the right to choose well know.
Broomstick wrote:Again, as I pointed out in an earlier post, US law stops at the border of the US. If a US citizen goes abroad and performs an act illegal in one or several locations in the US, or even under Federal law (that's the law that applies to all 50 states - and applies to only a small number of crimes), but that act is performed abroad, outside of US jurisdiction, that citizen can not be prosecuted for that act under US law (though they certainly could be prosecuted under the laws of the locality where they committed the deed). So yes, it would apply to acts on US military bases and on the grounds of embassies and the like, but no - US law does not apply outside the US - even for US citizens.
I don't think that's entirely correct. Jurisdiction of a country's courts generally extends to the citizens of that country even in cases where they commit actions abroad that are criminalized in the country's legal system (even if not criminalized where they were committed). Of course, this only applies if the primary jurisdiction (the country where it happened) chooses not to do anything about it. It also works so that if the person commits an act abroad that is against the law in that country but not in his native one, his native courts cannot obviously convict on anything.
Obviously these statutes and principles are not applied except in serious cases (pedophilia being one of the things considered serious, as is murder). There are even cases in the US where Americans going out of country for some pedophiliac activities have been arrested and convicted, exactly on this basis.
Broomstick wrote:This fact, by the way, is the basis the Bush administration holding certain terror suspects outside the US - US law regarding legal interrogation methods do not apply. The Supreme Court did decide that Gitmo in Cuba was under US jurisdiction, and thus US law (it's a US military base, after all), but it wouldn't apply to holding someone in a crude cell in the basement of a house rented in, say, Pakistan, when said house had no connection to a US base or embassy. That's the legal stance - whether that's a moral stance or not is a different question.
Perhaps, in this respect, the law of the US are significantly different from the laws of various European countries.
It'd still be under US jurisdiction especially if the people doing the torturing etc were doing so in US government employ and under orders. However, in cases like this, it is often dependent on the victim seeking justice from the court unless the government does this on its own initiative (which it obviously won't if it's the gov committing the crime). This sort of thing is however not usually set in stone unless there are additional laws to cover that sort of instances. But these sort of jurisdiction issues are covered by existing international law of the most basic sort that allows countries to deal with each other (it's near the same type of basics as diplomatic immunity).
Broomstick wrote:I will, however, mention terrorism - if an act of terror is committed against the US, on US soil, then the US feels US law applies - because the act occured on US soil. And extradition will be sought. (Or even a war fought over it, such as in Afganistan). However, the legal picture becomes quite murky if the act of terror occurs abroad. And there is NO basis in US law for prosecution if a US citizen engages in terrorist acts against another country - such a person most probably has broken the law in the country the committed the act and the US would certainly consent to extradition, but they could NOT be prosecuted under US law because, in that case, US law does not apply.
And it gets murkier still, because unless I'm completely mistaken, the US claims jurisdiction over crimes such as murder committed against its citizens abroad (obviously only if the primary jurisdiction fails to act) but even then it needs to get its hands on the perp and transport him to a US court.
This is a thorny and anything but straightforward issue, and it seems to have cropped up a lot in the recent weeks and months. For the other relevant discussions on this issue (at least ones I've seen), you can probably hit them with the search function by using my name and the term "jurisdiction".
Broomstick wrote:I will grant, though, that the Austrians are free to decide the qualifications for citizenship in their own country, and if they feel so offended as to strip the current governor of California of his Austrian citizenship there is absolutely nothing anyone here can do about that.
That's the crux of the matter and it got buried under a whole shitload of obscurement. I doubt they'll do anything, it'd just give them a lot of bad publicity, which as of now is only confined to the nutcake who made the suggestion.
Edi
It doesn't fly. A country's law stops at that country's borders.
