According to this report from CBS News, martial law has been declared in the City of New Orleans.
New Orleans, LA (CBS) – Martial Law has been declared in New Orleans as conditions continued to deteriorate. Water levels in The Big Easy and it’s suburbs are rising at dangerous levels and officials stated they don’t know where the water is coming from. Residents are being urged to get out of New Orleans in any way they can as officials fear “life will be unsustainable” for days or even weeks.
What this really means is unclear. As Donald Sensing points out, it seems unlikely that this is martial law in the true sense of the term
I think it?s also possible that no official with the authority to declare martial law has actually done so, at least not in the true legal sense. It may be that the term is being used as a shorthand way of saying that civil order will be energetically, even ruthlessly, enforced by civil police and National Guard troops. I?m guessing also that the governor has empowered ordinary Guard soldiers to make arrests and has authorized Guard units to hold offenders prisoner without quickly turning them over to civil police.
What I do not expect to see is civilians being tried by military courts ? the distinction indicated above that the Supreme Court has held key as to whether martial law has actually been imposed. It may be true that the capability of civil courts in New Orleans to try offenders has been ended for many days to come, but if so it?s also true that military courts have not been established there, either, and won?t be established before civil courts come back into operation.
More likely than not, what this really means is that the National Guard, and possibly even Regular Army forces (who were brought in during the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew) will be performing the types of tasks normally left to civilian agencies such as the police. Civilian law will continue to function.
If nothing else, though, this is an indication of how bad things really are down there.
It also happens to be another twist on the issues I raised in my post about libertarian responses to government emergency powers.
H/T: Michelle Malkin
