Obama: White House won't wade into CIA torture report dispute at this point

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

28. The problem seems to me that Obama is ignoring the law for purely political reasons

Torture is prohibited under 18 USC § 2340. See also § 2340A, which says that those who order the torture are just as culpable. I should mention the Supreme Court case of Wilkerson v. Utah, 99 U.S. 130 (1879). Justice Clifford, in delivering the opinion of the Court, said:

Difficulty would attend the effort to define with exactness the extent of the constitutional provision which provides that cruel and unusual punishments shall not be inflicted; but it is safe to affirm that punishments of torture, such as those mentioned by the commentator referred to, and all others in the same line of unnecessary cruelty, are forbidden by that amendment to the Constitution.

(The "commenter" is Blackstone.)

There is also the UN Convention Against Torture, to which the US is a signatory. See in particular Article 1 and Article 16.

Had I been Obama, I would have said, in the first or second day of my presidency, "I am instructing the Attorney General to see if charges against former President Bush and former Vice President Cheney should be brought under 18 USC § 2340 and § 2340A (insert an explanation of these laws). If, as I expect, the Attorney General finds that charges should be brought, they will be. I realize that this action will be very unpopular in some quarters. However, I must emphasize that NO ONE is above the law. There is a legal maxim going back to the ancient Romans, Fiat justitia ruat caelum -- 'Let justice be done though the heavens fall.'"