Mexico, who allows hundred of thousands of its citizens (”immigrants”) to illegally cross over into the United States each year, has shown its “compassionate” side. The Mexican government has appealed to the World Court to “take urgent measures” to get the U.S. to stay all executions of Mexicans on Death Row in American jails.

Amazingly, President Bush had already agreed with the World Court back in 2004. The court, which resides at the Hague in the Netherlands, ruled that the trials of some 50 Mexicans on Death Row were in violation of the 1963 Vienna Convention.

It was then that Bush did something that was extraordinary for an American president: he not only deferred to a ruling by a World Court, but then issued an executive order to the state of Texas demanding that they review the case of a Mexican national on Death Row.

The World Court had ruled the Mexicans on Death Row had not had access to their country’s consular officials; that the Death Row convictions must be overturned; and, each case reviewed. Bush then issued his own Executive Order based on the ruling of the World Court.

The matter was taken to the Supreme Court, which in a majority decision, struck down Bush’s executive order and ruled that the Constitution “allows the President to execute the laws, not make them”.

The Mexican government now asks the World Court to take “urgent measures” and intercede on behalf of the Mexican nationals on American Death Rows. The World Court, also known as the International Court of Justice, is under the aegis of the United Nations. We weren’t sure just what “urgent” measures” the Mexican government was referring to, so we looked up the World Court at its website.

The World Court

Jurisdiction:

The International Court of Justice acts as a world court. The Court has a dual jurisdiction : it decides, in accordance with international law, disputes of a legal nature that are submitted to it by States (jurisdiction in contentious cases); and it gives advisory opinions on legal questions at the request of the organs of the United Nations or specialized agencies authorized to make such a request (advisory jurisdiction). Source – IInternational Court of Justice

The World Court states in its “jurisdiction” section that it gives “advisory” opinions on legal questions. Could a World Court ruling supersede decisions made by United States Courts?

According to the United States Supreme Court, the answer is a resounding “no”. The courts, when they struck down Bush’s meddling in the cases of the Mexican nationals who were on Death Row, ruled that judgments of the International Court of Justice, as the court is formally known, are not binding on U.S. courts and that Bush’s 2005 executive order, that courts in Texas comply anyway does not change that”.

Chief Justice Roberts wrote that the World Court, nor the “operative part of the United Nations Charter, creates binding law in the absence of implementing legislation from Congress”. He also pointed out that Bush did not have the “power to issue a directive that reaches deep into the heart of the state’s police powers and compels state courts to reopen final criminal judgments and set aside neutrally applicable state laws”.

We find the concern show by the Mexican government for Mexican nationals on American’s Death Rows to be a bit bewildering as a report released by the Mexico Congress in 2007 found that Mexico’s own citizens live in what is considered to be one of the world’s most dangerous countries to live in, in regards to crime.

A report issued in September of 2007 by Mexico’s own Congress revealed that Mexico’s murder rate “tops all others (countries) in the Western Hemisphere”. Mexico’s deadly surge of violence in such crimes as kidnappings, many of whom are Americans, and gangland executions, has turned Mexico into “one of the world’s most dangerous countries”. One analyst who worked on the report said Mexico’s murder rate now tops all others in the Western Hemisphere.

“In a global context, we suffer from more homicides, that is to say, violent deaths, than any other region in the world except for certain regions on the African continent,” said Eduardo Rojas, who helped put together the crime report at the Center for Social and Public Opinion Studies, a research arm of the Mexico’s Chamber of Deputies.”

This “compassion” for the rights of Mexican Nationals on America’s Death Rows by the Mexican government could be construed as yet another instance of the “let’s feel good about ourselves when we make grown up decisions Liberal-think”. Or an example of Anal-Think versus the Big Picture.

The Big Picture in Mexico

Mexico’s own citizens live in daily fear for their lives. They face deadly drug cartel gang wars and the numerous corrupt local courts and police while their own government focuses its attention on the Mexican Nationals sitting on American Death Rows. Their officials want to make sure that before their fellow countrymen are executed for their crimes, that every avenue was available to them for a “fair” trial. This is standard practice in the United States, illegal immigrants who commit crimes are afforded free legal representation and the knowledge that our system is free from the corruption that permeates the Mexican criminal justice system, from the local police and courts, all the way up to the state and Federal levels.

While their government demands that the World Court take “urgent measures” to intercede on the behalf of those who have been convicted in American courts and find themselves on Death Row, Mexico’s own citizens are left to pick up the bloody pieces of that day’s gangland shootouts with nowhere to turn.

If the World Court has free time on its hands it could perhaps address the Mexican government’s blind eye in allowing some 12 million plus of its citizens to illegally relocate to the United States. The United States ensures that when each “immigrant” is charged with committing a heinous crime here in the States, that every legal remedy, including free legal representation, is available to them. This is called the Big Picture.

Perhaps ordinary American citizens would be more sympathetic to the plight of Mexican Nationals on Death Row if we weren’t so busy playing hostess, and Bush playing host, to the vast numbers of Mexicans entering our country illegally.

by LBG
Source – McClatchy Washington – Mexico Crime Continues to Surge
Source – Washington Post – Justices Rebuff Bush and World Court
Source - Sign On San Diego – Mexico Asks World Court to stay executions in the U.S.

Image – World Court