Memo to 9/11 Truthers: The Courts Are Not A Megaphone

So, it’s come to this. The crackpots who believe that 9/11 was an inside job perpetrated by the Bush administration, the Israeli government, or lizard-men from space (seriously) have graduated from standing on the street with sandwich boards and megaphones to filing lawsuits against current and former federal officials in court, alleging that they were behind the attacks.

These lawsuits were focused on former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Vice President Dick Cheney. The plaintiffs claimed that Rumsfeld, Cheney, and others either allowed the attacks to occur, or directly orchestrated them, in order to create a political climate that would be supportive of war in the Middle East, which would open up access to Middle Eastern oil, from which they would theoretically profit.

I’m not going to go into the details of why these allegations are completely absurd. Suffice it to say, I think that if you’re a 9/11 “truther” (a member of the ironically-named 9/11 “truth” movement, which promotes these conspiracy theories), there’s probably something wrong with you. Either that, or you’ve spent too much time in your basement reading pamphlets, and not enough time out in the real world.

Instead, I’m going to discuss the merits and implications of using the judicial system to advance these insane theories. Here’s the short version: you shouldn’t use the court system to advance whatever pet conspiracy theory you’re currently harboring. The end.

Of course, the reasons for this warrant at least some discussion. First of all, contrary to popular perception, the court system actually has some pretty efficient mechanisms at filtering out frivolous lawsuits. These cases are usually dismissed very quickly, and, in the most extreme cases, the people who bring them can be hit with hefty fines, to compensate the taxpayers for the time and judicial resources that were wasted dealing with the case, and to deter others from bringing frivolous lawsuits.

In the case I linked to in the first paragraph, the court that dismissed the lawsuits back in 2010 hit the lawyers who brought it with $15,000 in sanctions. And the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has just upheld that sanctions order. This is pretty similar to the case of Orly Taitz – a dentist/lawyer who is obsessed with the notion that Barack Obama was not born in the United States, and is therefore constitutionally ineligible to serve as president.

She has been filing numerous lawsuits in the last few years, demanding everything from the removal of the President from office to his imprisonment for treason.  Not surprisingly, she has to contend with sanctions and threats of disbarment pretty frequently.

I think that the courts should deal with lawsuits based on nonsensical conspiracy theories in precisely this manner. It’s very important for citizens of a free society to have as much access to the courts as possible. In the U.S., state and federal courts are the primary means of adjudicating legal disputes, and ensuring that legal rights are protected. However, that does not mean that every conspiracy theory is automatically a valid legal dispute.

In order to ensure that they can operate efficiently, and hear valid legal disputes, courts have to dismiss the lawsuits that are clearly nonsense. I think it’s pretty obvious that these all-encompassing conspiracy theories fail the smell test. The notion that human beings (who couldn’t cover up a hotel break-in in the 70s, remember) could pull off a conspiracy of that magnitude without leaving a single piece of definitive evidence is insane.

And even if you assume that these conspiracy theories are true, and that some shadowy cabal really did pull off 9/11, what do the plaintiffs in this lawsuit expect to accomplish? Do they really think that a federal trial court would be able to do anything to such an all-powerful organization?

It’s almost as if they simply want to draw attention to themselves. Funny, that.

Anyway, when actual smoke-and-mirrors government conspiracies take place, they’re typically found out. Prior to the Watergate scandal, the facts of that case could have been the plot of a political thriller – and it would probably have been considered implausible. But, it happened. Conspiracy theorists will point out that this shows that government conspiracies do happen. And they’re right. But it also shows that keeping a secret among more than 2 or 3 people is incredibly difficult. Remember, Watergate ended with a president resigning in disgrace.

So, it stands to reason that, if these 9/11 conspiracy theories were true, there would be some solid evidence that might have a chance of holding up in court. However, 9/11 truthers have produced no such evidence. Hence, their cases have all been dismissed.

The court system already has a moderate problem with people accepting its legitimacy. It is the constant target of politically-motivated attacks against “judicial activism” and “frivolous lawsuits.” Occasionally, there really are frivolous lawsuits, like the one discussed here. If the court were to do anything other than dismiss this case at the earliest opportunity, opportunistic politicians and activists would have pounced on it, and used it to attack the legitimacy of the court system as a whole. Frankly, we can’t afford that.

That’s not to say I think the court should use the public’s opinion of it as a significant basis for making its decisions. But, as a practical matter, that is always lingering in the background. If I believed that there were a shred of real evidence in support of these conspiracy theories, I’d be completely in favor of the courts hearing these lawsuits. And if the 9/11 truthers can produce such evidence, I’d be championing their right to pursue these cases, even if they were ultimately proven to be without merit. Until then, it’s back to the Internet massage boards for them.