American Civil Liberties Union

The medical professionals worked to strap the detainee "into a chair, Velcro his head to a metal restraint, then tether a tube into the man's stomach through his nose to pump in liquid nourishment twice a day."

After the Miami Herald wrote about the 30 hunger striking detainees in the Guantánamo Bay detention camps in January, we were concerned. We wrote an urgent letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates to bring his attention to the cruel, inhuman, degrading and unlawful treatment of the 30 hunger striking detainees. In that letter, we pointed out that hunger strikes were indications of a larger problem concerning the conditions of confinement at the detention camp. A week later, Amnesty International, Human Rights First and Human Rights Watch joined us in writing to President Obama requesting full access to the detention facility at Guantánamo to independently examine and report on conditions of confinement. We still have not received an answer to our request.

When President Obama issued an executive order calling on the Department of Defense (DOD) to investigate conditions of confinement at Guantánamo and whether they conformed to Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and to "other applicable laws," we hoped that the DOD report would shed some light on the actual conditions at the camp and the role of medical personnel during interrogations and forced feedings.

One month later, the DOD report came out and the DOD – unsurprisingly, since the DOD was policing itself – claimed that conditions at Gitmo were in compliance with the Geneva Conventions. We knew this was a total whitewash, and that a real independent assessment would be necessary to ascertain the actual conditions at Guantánamo.

In a letter to the Obama administration made public today, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) expressed concerns over a lack of progress to end racial discrimination in the United States. In particular, the letter urged the Obama administration and Congress to do more to end racial profiling, like passing the End Racial Profiling Act and reconsidering the 287(g) program. Monday's announcement that the federal government will investigate allegations of bias against Latino crime victims by police in Suffolk County, New York is an encouraging step, though there is plenty more to be done.

Consider this set of facts, courtesy of the Pew Center on the States: between 1987 and 2007, state spending on corrections rose by a whopping 127 percent. During that same time period, spending on higher education increased by a mere 21 percent; in some states, higher education spending actually decreased while corrections spending increased.

Where are our country's priorities? Spending such large amounts on incarceration leaves less in the pot for other critical goals, like educating our nation's youth. Far too many young people are trapped in under-resourced public schools, plagued by inadequate resources — a lack of quali­fied teachers, counselors, special edu­cation services, and even textbooks — and the prioritization of discipline over instruction. Overly broad zero tolerance policies and an increased use of police in schools have criminalized a wide variety of behaviors previously dealt with by teachers and principals, and funneled countless youth out of classrooms and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems — a phenomenon advocates have termed the "school-to-prison pipeline."

Youth of color are hit particularly hard by this divestment in education and over-reliance on discipline, harsh punishment and incarceration. Indeed, when African-American and white youth misbehave in school, the African-American students are far more likely than their white peers to be suspended, expelled, or arrested for the same kind of conduct. This over-criminalization extends to the justice system, where youth and adults of color are arrested, detained and incarcerated at disproportionate rates.

Now — in the midst of our economic tailspin — is our opportunity to do things differently, to rebuild our communities according to more equitable principles and a respect for human rights.

Tomorrow marks World Day Against the Death Penalty, and it is only fitting that a global call was issued to abolish the practice. We join the ambassadors of the European Union (EU) who gathered today to call on all nations to abolish the cruel practice.

Ambassador John Bruton, the head of EU delegation to the U.S., stated: "The EU not only considers capital punishment to be cruel and inhumane, but it also fails to deter criminal behavior and represents an unacceptable denial of human dignity and integrity. Miscarriages of justice are inevitable in any legal system – and any miscarriage of justice that results in the death penalty is irreversible."