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I affirm the resolution resolved a just government ought to prioritize civil liberties
over national security.
The criterion is preserving human dignity.
The ability for rational human beings to decide what they ought to do, or the moral
law, is what gives humans intrinsic value, or human dignity.
Rachels 1986
James Rachels was an American philosopher who specialized in ethics and animal rights. From
James Rachels, The Elements of Moral Philosophy, pp. 114-17,122-23. Copyright 1986 by
Random House, Inc.
Second, and even more important, humans have an intrinsic worth, i.e., dignity, because
they are rational agents - that is, free agents capable of making their own decisions,

setting their own goals, and guiding their conduct by reason. Because the moral law is
the law of reason, rational beings are the embodiment of the moral law itself. The only
way that moral goodness can exist at all in the world is for rational creatures to
apprehend what they should do and, acting from a sense of duty, do it. This, Kant thought,
is the only thing that has moral worth. Thus-if there were no rational beings, the moral dimension of the world
would simply disappear. It makes no sense, therefore, to regard rational beings merely as one kind of valuable thing
among others. They are the beings for whom mere things have value, and they are the beings whose
conscientious actions have moral worth. So Kant concludes that their value must be absolute, and not
comparable to the value of anything else. If their value is beyond all price, it follows that

rational beings must be treated always as an end, and never as a means only. This
means; on the most superficial level, that we have a strict duty of beneficence toward other
persons: we must strive to promote their welfare; we must respect their rights, avoid
harming them, and generally endeavor, so far as we can, to further the ends of others.

Countries use torture as a means to get information for National security

threats from suspects and prsionsers but, According to the Un No one shall
be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment states
Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations
General Assembly in 1948. Therefore torture is a violation of human riights and civil
liberties. Science shows torture is counterproductive. Although pain is

commonly assumed to facilitate cooperation, scientific research suggests

abusive questioning including sleep deprivation and stress positions
makes it less likely that a detainee will provide his questioners useful
information

Torture and its effects

January 2010 7 Letter from General Powell to Senator McCain, September 13,
2006; http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/politics/PowellLetter.pdf 8
Interview with Testification In congress 2015

1 History shows a poor record of success for those who use

torture. Popular wisdom holds that the Germans (during WWII), the Egyptians, the
Syrians, the French (in Algeria), the British (in Northern Ireland), the Israelis, and
others have engaged in forms of coercive questioning that have been effective. But
Darius Rejali, a political scientist from Oregon who has spent decades examining the
evidence, says these statements are among the biggest myths associated with
torture and the proof of the efficacy of the use of coercion in all but a handful of
these cases is not possible to find.
2 Abusive questioning only strengthens the commitment of

some detainees to their cause. The Kubark manual, a CIA intelligence

guide, explains: Interrogatees who have withstood pain are more difficult to handle
by other methods. The effect (of coercive questioning) has been not to repress the
subject but to restore his confidence and maturity.
3

Torture can be so debilitating that prisoners are unable to

respond coherently to questions. Educing Information, a comprehensive
study of interrogation science and practice developed for the U.S. intelligence
community in 2006, warns, "The very means by which coercive methods undermine
the source's resistance posture also may concomitantly degrade their ability to
report the intelligence information they possess in a valid, comprehensive fashion."
4 Torture often leads to a waste of time and resources. Coercive
questioning will lead to a multitude of bogus new leads as the victims generate
made-up information to make the pain stop. Everything they say will need to be
checked and rechecked, wasting valuable time and manpower. 1 See, for example,
the conclusions of Educing Information, a landmark study prepared for the U.S.
intelligence community which finds (among other things) that "[p]sychological
theory and some (indirectly) related research suggest that coercion or pressure can
actually increase a source's resistance and determination not to comply. (185) 2
Washington Post, 12/16/07; Outlook section 3 Kubark Manual, July 1963; from
Section H entitled Pain 4 Educing Information, p. 133 FACT SHEET The
overwhelming majority of professional interrogators say they do not need to use
torture to make suspects talk. U.S. interrogators are near-unanimous in their view
that legal, rapport-building techniques are more sophisticated and a more effective
way to elicit information from a hostile detainee. Even in so-called ticking time
bomb scenarios, professional U.S. interrogators from the armed services, the CIA
and the FBI have told Human Rights First that they would not use torture because it
is such an unreliable way to question detainees.

U.S. interrogators have a long history of success stretching

back from the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan through
Vietnam, Korea and WWII. The most wanted men in Iraq Saddam Hussein
and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were discovered by U.S. interrogators using legal
techniques, not torture. The National Defense Intelligence College researched some
of the most successful U.S. interrogators of all time in a study called Interrogation:
World War II, Vietnam, and Iraq, that was printed in 2008. The study shows that U.S.
interrogators have succeeded over and over again, in difficult situations, using
traditional rapport-building techniques permitted by U.S. and international law.
Torture will turn the local population against you, decreasing the likelihood that
walkins will provide useful information. A common mistake in intelligence
gathering, according to experts, is to overvalue the potential to obtain information
from detainees and undervalue tips from the local population. 90% of the best
intelligence comes from open sources and walk-ins according to a recent report
from Major General Michael Flynn, an intelligence officer with extensive experience
in Afghanistan. The real intelligence hero is Sherlock Holmes, not James Bond,
Flynn says.
6 Using torture places U.S. troops at greater risk. Violation of
basic rules of international law by U.S. interrogators puts U.S. forces at greater risk
that they will be tortured when they fall into enemy hands. Many senior U.S. military
officials, including General Collin Powell , have cited this concern in explaining why
they oppose torture.
7 The use of torture undercuts U.S. moral credibility and
serves as a recruiting tool for terrorists. U.S. soldiers who worked in
interrogation facilities in Iraq say that detainees often would be picked up with their
pockets filled with pictures of abused prisoners from Abu Ghraib. It was the number
one reason we would hear for why people had picked up arms against us, Eric
Maddox, the interrogator who spearheaded the hunt for Saddam Hussein, told
Human Rights First.8 5
8 Torture has severe medical consequences. The consequences of
torture reach far beyond immediate pain. Many victims suffer from post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD), which includes symptoms such as flashbacks (or intrusive thoughts), severe
anxiety, insomnia, nightmares, depression and memory lapses, Torture victims often feel
guilt and shame triggered by the humiliation they have endured. All such symptoms are
normal human responses to abnormal and inhuman treatment.

Thus I affirm.