Tuesday, December 25, 2018

And Another Government Secrecy Thing

John Roberts, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, acted yesterday to hold off a contempt citation versus an unnamed company in an unspecified case.

The company's arguments against being required to comply with the subpoena are:

1) That it's not a US company and therefore not subject to US jurisdiction; and

2) That complying with the subpoena would violate the laws of the country it is from.

Which both make sense to me -- it seems the last few years, the US government just seems to assume that its laws apply to everyone and everything, everywhere. I strongly suspect the US government would react very negatively to, say, the Russian government trying to enforce Russian law in, say, the District of Columbia.

But at least as bothersome to me is the "unnamed" and "unspecified" part.

We're supposed to have a public judicial system in this country. Prosecutors and courts shouldn't be able to keep secrets concerning who has been subpoenaed and why.

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