Nat Hentoff, a friend and hero to many of us here, phoned the other day to say he was sending in a letter about our editorial on the 9/11 detainees and that it was going to be “blistering.” Our headline on our editorial, “Sentelle’s Sense,” referred to David Sentelle of the District of Columbia Circuit, who wrote the court’s decision that neither the Freedom of Information Act nor the First Amendment required America to release the names of certain prisoners it was holding in connection with the war against Islamic terrorism. A gaggle of anti-war organizations had tried to get the Supreme Court to hear the case, but couldn’t get the required quota of four justices to vote even for a hearing. In refusing to see this as the end of civil liberties in America, The New York Sun, Mr. Hentoff reckons, has joined the Supreme Court in having “pushed around the Constitution.”

To our friend Mr. Hentoff, whose love of the Constitution has made his column in the Village Voice an important American institution, we would suggest he take a break from the war. Maybe he could tap out another column defending the rights of the unborn. Either that or take another read of the documents in Center for National Security Studies. One thing he’ll find is that this case is not about the rights of the detainees. Some have been freed or deported. Some are in custody while charges are pending. Some are being detained after a federal court issued a material witness warrant to secure their testimony. The government’s brief points out that all individuals in all three groups have the right to counsel and the right to talk to the press, unless, in the case of the material witnesses, to do so would violate a “court’s particular sealing order.”

No, this case is not about the rights of the detainees. It’s about the rights of the gaggle of left-wing groups and their supporters who are the plaintiffs. Left-wing groups, of course, deserve as many rights as right-wing or centrist or any other groups. But what the appeals court concluded — and the Supreme Court let stand — was that the information being sought by these antiwar groups is not covered by the Freedom of Information Act. Congress, the court pointed out, specifically wrote into the law certain exemptions that permit withholding information “compiled for law enforcement purposes.” These are not blanket exemptions, but the court reviewed the various categories and found that these exemptions easily applied here.

As to the claims of access under the First Amendment, the court spoke with exceptional clarity. The First, it said, states that “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”The amendment’s “plain language,” it noted, “broadly protects the freedom of individuals and the press to speak or publish.” But: “It does not expressly address the right of the public to receive information.” It went on to cite various court interpretations on this point, including one case, Houchins, where the court explained that the “public’s interest in knowing about its government is protected by the guarantee of a Free Press, but the protection is indirect. The Constitution itself is neither a Freedom of Information Act nor an Official Secrets Act.”

And then there’s the case of Milligan, which was cited by Justice Hentoff in his letter, which we print along side. Milligan, which dealt with habeas corpus, wasn’t discussed by the appeals court in the documents relating to Center for National Security Studies because it is completely irrelevant. Habeas corpus is not at issue in the cases to which Center for National Securities Studies relates. The individuals can have lawyers, who are free to file for writs of habeas corpus, though we doubt they’d get far because they’re either being lawfully detained or have been released. The famous quotation that Mr. Hentoff cites from Milligan about the Constitution being a law “for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace” is one we couldn’t agree with more. There’s no reason to forget that rulers were included.