The Rule of Law Oral History Project

The Rule of Law Oral History Project, initiated in 2008, explores the state of human and civil rights in the post-9/11 world. In its first year, the project conducted a series of interviews with attorneys in order to document legal challenges against capital punishment in the United States. Recognizing important intersections between litigation challenging the administration of capital punishment and the legal architecture of post-9/11 detention policies and practices, the Rule of Law Oral History Project expanded in 2010 to study the statutory and constitutional challenges of the use of the detention facilities at Guantánamo Bay.
Select interviews from the project are featured here.

Dan Aalbers
Psychologist and Activist, Coalition for an Ethical Psychology

Ghislaine Boulanger
Psychologist; co-founder of Psychologists for an Ethical APA

Richard H. Burr
Burr and Welch P.C.; Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel

Mark Fallon
Deputy Commander, Criminal Investigation Task Force

Elizabeth Holtzman
U.S. Congresswoman, D-New York, 1973-1981

Ramzi Kassem
Associate Professor, CUNY School of Law; attorney for several GTMO detainees

Brittain Mallow
Commander, Criminal Investigation Task Force

A. Raymond Randolph
Senior Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit

Clive Stafford Smith
Director, Reprieve; Attorney for several GTMO detainees

Jeremy Varon
Witness Against Torture; co-editor, The Sixties journal

Andy Worthington
Journalist and author, The Guantánamo Files

Feroz Ali Abassi
Cageprisoners Caseworker; former Guantánamo detainee

Yvonne R. Bradley
Defense Counsel, Judge Advocate General Corps, U.S. Air Force

V. Stuart Couch
Prosecutor, Guantánamo Bay Military Commissions

Karen J. Greenberg
Director, Center on National Security, Fordham Law School

Scott Horton
Journalist, "No Comment" blog, Harper's Magazine

Zachary P. Katznelson
Senior Staff Attorney, ACLU National Security Project

Jane Mayer
Author, The Dark Side; staff writer, The New Yorker

Michael Ratner
President Emeritus, Center for Constitutional Rights

John Paul Stevens
Associate Justice, U.S. Supreme Court, Retired

Lawrence B. Wilkerson
Former Chief of Staff to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell

Stephen N. Xenakis
Psychiatrist; Brigadier General, U.S. Army, Retired

Anthony G. Amsterdam
University Professor, New York University School of Law

Stephen B. Bright
President and Senior Counsel, the Southern Center for Human Rights

Morris D. Davis
Chief Prosecutor, Guantánamo Bay Military Commissions

Daniel Heyman
Artist, Abu Ghraib Detainee Interview Project

Jameel Jaffer
Deputy Legal Director, American Civil Liberties Union

Pardiss Kebriaei
Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights

Gareth Peirce
Attorney for Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal, and Rhuhel Ahmed

Steven Reisner
Psychologist and Activist, Coalition for an Ethical Psychology

Charles D. Swift
Military Defense Attorney for Salim Hamdan, Hamdan v. Rumsfeld

P. Sabin Willett
Attorney for Uighur detainees at GTMO

Moazzam Begg
Cageprisoners Director; former Guantánamo detainee

Cerie Bullivant
Cageprisoners Caseworker Intern; former control order detainee

Joshua L. Dratel
Attorney for Guantánamo detainee David Hicks

Joseph P. Hoar
Former Commander-in-Chief, United States Central Command [CENTCOM]

Shane Kadidal
Senior Managing Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights

Robert C. Kirsch
Co-lead Counsel, Boumediene v. Bush; Partner, WilmerHale

Asim Qureshi
Cageprisoners Executive Director and Research Director

James Robertson
Senior Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Retired

Ricardo M. Urbina
Senior Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Retired

Thomas B. Wilner
Attorney for Kuwaiti detainees at GTMO