Does the Constitution Protect the Rights of Non-Citizens?

There has long been controversy about whether or not the U.S. government is required to extend legal protection to non-American nationals, especially those who are caught up in the War on Terror. The people imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay, for example, have been granted no due process, have been tortured, and are being detained indefinitely. This is certainly not the average experience for American citizens accused of crimes by the U.S. government, though certainly not unheard of. Chelsea Manning comes to mind.

The argument from supporters of keeping Guantanamo Bay Prison open is that not only are these people not Americans, and thus not guaranteed due process rights under the Constitution, but they are also not criminals but rather enemies in a war.

Now let us grant for the sake of argument the dubious claim that the authorizations to use force in Afghanistan and Iraq were perfectly constitutional and legitimate declarations of war in and of themselves. These authorizations would still not legitimize the open policy of both the Bush and Obama administrations that the entire planet is a battlefield in the War on Terror. So the authorizations to use force in Afghanistan and Iraq cannot possibly be used to justify waging war in Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Pakistan, or anywhere else the U.S. regularly conducts operations. Therefore, prisoners of Guantanamo Bay who were captured in these countries cannot possibly be considered legitimate prisoners of war. They were instead illegally abducted and imprisoned in what amounts to an aggressive act of war against these countries by the United States government.

This, however, is a very specific flaw in the argument, which can be wholly undermined by simply pointing out that while the Constitution does not specifically protect the rights of non-citizens, it more importantly does not grant the U.S. government any power to treat them any differently than American citizens. If we take the Tenth Amendment seriously, as many conservatives claim to do, then we must accept the fact that nowhere does the Constitution grant the U.S. government authority to build a prison in a foreign country and indefinitely detain foreign nationals without charge or trial. Simply put, one cannot pretend to be a strict constructionist and advocate the U.S. government treating foreign nationals any differently than American citizens in regards to the law.

The Constitution demands that the U.S. government bring charges against persons accused of a crime and give them a quick and speedy trial. It does not say bring charges against the accused and give them a quick and speedy trial unless they are not American citizens and/or we are at war with their country. No, the Constitution gives only one route for the U.S. government to behave and it makes no distinctions between Americans and everyone else.

So the answer to the question is simply yes, the Constitution does protect the rights of non-citizens because it does not give power to the federal government to treat them differently.