future. >> and what the you helping him do? >> at think we are trying to get this book on kendall and kits with more technology, but more importantly and trying to help him understand as best as possible the financial world and why had funds and private equity funds can help. they're not the enemy but part of the solution. we need financial engineering. >> i say both the true. >> thank you both. >> engineering that led to the crisis. credo that his hand. so we don't have to agree. not disagreeable. >> thank you both very much. >> next on book tv .. >> "washin

continues. host: we have the co-author of the new books, "this burning land." his wife, jennifer griffin, the co-author of this book, as well. greg, mr. with you. let's start with what is really best palestinian conflict continues today. guest: it has been going on for six decades. tenures ago, they were close to an agreement. but they have worked backwards -- 10 years ago, they were close to an agreement. we wanted to emphasize how they dug a deeper hole for

themselves. hamas is in control of gaza. relish solomons have expanded from 100,000 to 300,000 today so. a lot of the problems have multiplied and become even larger. that is one thing we wanted to emphasize. it's a deepening of the conflict. >> this includes your personal stories. you have live there. you have raised two small children. you there from 1999 to 2007. you said that israel has a thriving economy. but they cannot solve this problem. guest: one reason we wrote this book is we felt that there is a lot of talk in washington if we could just give back to the peace process. we always hear, if we just can go back to the peace process and get the israelis and

palestinians talking as they did when you talk been -- itzyak rabin was on the scene. during the time we live there, the psychological landscape between the israelis and palestinians changed to such a degree. you need to come at the problem with a new perspective as to how both sides were changed. >> -- host: what did they not understand about the conflict that you think they should understand, given that you were on the ground? guest: the way these issues have become more difficult. the economies were very much integrated. israelis and palestinians could travel back and forth. every day, palestinians were like commuters.

they would come to work in israel and go home at the end of the day. israel is would go to the west bank. there was economic integration to a degree. the kinds of segregation and divisions have become much more permanent and locked in place. these will be hard to reverse. you just cannot go back a decade and dust off the old plan. host: when you first arrive, was it that sparked the decline t three? there? guest: the spark that unleashed a lot of built up anger and frustration that the peace process had not gone as the palestinians and israel is had hoped. there was frustration on the palestinian side. we described in the first chapter or the first deaths on

the temple mount bacchant september of 2000. it is not that that's part or cause the intifada. but we bring to in this chapter is the back start of what made him go there that day. we have interviews and stories and the back story behind what motivated him to go there that day. and then everything that unfolded from that. you have to understand those initial days. greg is fond of saying it just takes a small spark in the middle east. look at what is happening in tunis. man set himself on fire. now you have a revolution in libya. there was a human rights activist who had been arrested in those early days and that is what sparked the protests. all it takes to the middle east is a spark. our point is that you cannot ignore the israeli-palestinian

conflict. it may not be a front burner issue right now. you need to understand this conflict. host: you do need to understand what it means to both sides. do you think that is important? guest: absolute. will you have is the holiest destroyedjudea saism twice. and now you have one of the most important shrines in islam built on top of that. ariel sharon went up there to walk around. he did not go into the religious shrine. but walking around in flamed muslim passions. jews pray the western wall. that is the most explosive piece of real estate in the entire middle east. guest: you have to understand how layered it is and the

proximity and also how small the place is. we tried to paint the picture in the book. we take the leader there on that day when aerial shot walked onto the temple mount. i was there. the next day, friday prayers. jews were praying at the western wall. i did not understand that how on top of each other the mosque and worthy jews were praying. there is a beautiful picture. the last picture. it is in the old city. it shows an arab and a jewish worshiper passing each other in the old city. the above cannot see each other. they are covered. it is and amazing fatah. it symbolizes so much.

walking down this narrow streets, streets that have been there since jesus walked the same path. there faces are covered and they do not see each other. host: fast for to today. do the palestinians -- fast forward to today. this is the holiest offer the palestinians. israel might take it away. guest: absolutely. this is where diplomacy will have to comment. you have to be creative. there were notions that the mosque and the religious compound that had been there for 1300 years would remain in muslim hands. but that the ground below it be in jewish hands. talking about belowground would have one sovereign and above ground would have another sovereign. you're going to have to come up

with some very creative solutions. this is the one spot for an israeli leader to relinquish sovereignty of the holiest site .n judea's aism this is a difficult thing for any politician. host: you conducted a lot interviews while you live there. you got personal stories down to the specifics of this conflict. ,'m wondering from both of you is the end goal of statehood more important, or is the site? guest: it depends for whom you're talking about. i think what we're hearing now is interesting. in recent days, there has been talked about palestinians going for a vote about palestinian

statehood. that will force israel's hand. have shimon peres -- you have the shimon peres coming to the white house tomorrow. israel is concerned if the palestinians and go to a vote at the u.n. general assembly, that they will overnight have a state and if certain things are not discussed, that is going to put this conflict and take a turn that many israelis are concerned about. president bush was the first american president to declare that two states are two peoples was the goal of u.s. policy and that the palestinians deserve a state. that was a major step forward. we have seen so much movement. sometimes looks like the israelis and palestinians are locked in a tight race. it's been going on for ever.

there is a lot going on. you need to predict what we try to do -- this is a very -- we have to introduce you to characters on both sides of the conflict. you can actually crossed the front lines on any given day and report from both sides of the conflict on the same day. that is what we wanted to show. through the eyes of these characters that we have met, what are the issues, what drives them to fit what motivates them prove it will be the difficult issues ahead? guest: there are many good people on both sides and we profile many of them in the book who want peace. it is reason not to give up hope. tour elements that have a vested interest in keeping the conflict alive. i would point to hamas, who does not want to negotiate. this makes their argument and

their cause stronger, that israel should be destroyed. there are groups of settlers in the west bank who would like -- who believe that time is on their side. the more these settlements will become fixtures as part of connected to israel, and therefore they have a greater chance of remaining in place. host: want to move on to north africa. what impacts of those situations in libya had there? guest: the biggest impact was the change in egypt. the change -- the potential change of the government or the change of the government and the potential change of the relationship between egypt and israel and one thing in need to understand disease how nervous israel is our right now about what is going on around them,

because this is a cataclysmic change we're seeing appear we have had the same families in power in all these arab states. one interesting point is that for the first time in the history of the middle east, you're not hearing israel blamed for all the problems in the arab capitals. they are not turning around and the leaders are not able to say all their problems are because of the conflict not being solved. that is an interesting development. the situation in egypt is important for israel. there is the border between gaza and egypt. if the egyptians -- if the new egyptian government does not monitor that border, that is going to destabilize things in a serious way. i would say israelis are holding their breath as to the changes going on around them.

they do not know about the regime in syria. would be a huge change with regards to hezbollah -- that would be a huge change. all eyes right now on these other conflicts and it is not clear how the dust will settle. host: this is a headline from times."the new york what role of a plane in the middle east -- what role are they playing in the middle east? guest: it has been extraordinary what qatar has done. al jazeera has played a role in the arab world. they have the the u.s. military presence. they have decided that for many -- they have

contributed to an opening of discussion and dialogue in the arab world. it is an important thing. they have also avoided being involved in the unrest that you've seen elsewhere. host: we're talking about co- authors of this new book. we're talking about the new book and also the unrest in the middle east and northern africa. mike is a democrat. are you there? oops. i think we'll have to wait to see who else calls and. in.to see who else calls an caller: you folks are extremely knowledgeable and i appreciate your time.

what i like to know and i've been trying to find out, where is -- need the palestinians -- would need another hanan. was an excellent representative. we need her. guest: she's still very prominent in palestinian society, but less so on the international stage. she was a leading spokesperson in the 1990's. articulate, very persuasive. she was in some palestinian cabinets. have some friction with some of the other leaders and not a front-line political figure right now. but involved in developing education programs. she has a nonprofit that she runs.

she still very active, but you're not hearing her as the spokesperson. she was a powerful spokesperson. host: -- guest: she felt -- she and falling-out what the arafat regime and many of his cronies who took over afterwards. she was not in a good position with them. she would have felt the intifada did not serve the violent side -- it did not serve the larger cause. she is a woman of principle and i think she is funny she's better served working on women's issues in the palestinian area. tom, go ahead. are you with us? you are both back here in

washington now. let's talk about what you're doing. guest: i worked for fox news at the pentagon. i was in afghanistan if you weeks back. that is what we're doing. one thing we don't have a chance to talk about, the book talks about our personal life. working for two different news organizations in a tense time and also raising two small children. i gave birth to two daughters while we were living in israel. there were certain times when i would go to work with a flak jacket and a breast pump because i was nursing at the time. our girls were born in jerusalem. our second daughter was born on the eve of the iraq invasion. i checked into the hospital and they give us a certificate for a gas mask tent the babies.

adults are caring around gas masks for fear that saddam hussein would fire chemical weapons. that says so much about the psychology of the conflict. we say it is no exaggeration to say on the day they are born, israelis begin preparing for war. host: you are at npr. guest: i worked on the "addition" -- morning edition" program. host: our caller, tom, is back. caller: how is it going this morning? because of the uprising in africa, why do you think the uprising is so severe now? due to american change and

status with the president and everything? give me your notation on by the uprising there in africa and it seems to have been an uprising in the united states. guest: i believe you are referring to the north african countries that have exploded companies, libya, and egypt. something that has caught people by surprise. what you see in places that are frozen in time or the have one autocratic leader, there is not an allegory venue to practice any kind of normal politics where there are -- the views are suppressed. you can take one incident and things will explode. we mentioned this earlier with the episode in tunisia. someone was abuse by police and

this touched this off. this is percolating under the surface. as we a scene, it happened in half a dozen countries at least. guest: think also it is the advent of social media and the internet. a lot of these countries -- it was popular for these rulers and tyrants to keep their people separated from the outside world. you could keep them from knowing what was going on. that is impossible now in the age of the internet. greg mentioned the world with al jazeera in the middle east. qatar funded the station -- the satellite station that essentially was the spark for the revolution a decade ago. americans don't understand the role but al jazeera has played in the middle east. we have heard criticism of al jazeera during the early parts of the iraq invasion. there were seen as being anti- american. there were chandra -- there were

challenging all the leaders. that decade of freedom of information and speech and freedom of speech -- and freedom of the press, that was revolutionary. having access to twitter and facebook -- it was when one person said himself on fire, it was people in syria who saw what was going on and said, i want to be a part of this. this is the genie that cannot be put back into the bottle. this is the biggest change in the middle east since the end of the ottoman empire at the end of i.rld war r host: let's go to georgia on the democratic line, joan. caller: do you believe that the people of north africa and the

middle east are still optimistic about how the obama administration will handle things put he had a great opportunity at the beginning because he had some -- the last thing goes back to what you have been talking about with israel and the palestinians. the issue of water and water rights and how that plays. thank you. guest: i will answer the first question. if we think back, president obama went to cairo in june of 2009. he had been in office six months or so. he delivered a very big speech about the need for more open democratic arab world. it is not a coincidence. there was a lot of hope that things might change. i don't know that anyone thought it would come so dramatically and as fast as we have seen it. he was seen as inspiration. it is gone tricky.

president obama has found you have this often difficult choice between u.s. values and u.s. strategic interests. at times, they can conflict. i think the president's -- people in this part of the middle east and north africa do look to the united states. they are kind of wondering, would get full support to democratic opponents but does that mean military support? will we stand back of the obama administration is still figuring out its policies. people have the same issues. guest: in addition to president obama's speech in cairo, you have to go back to condoleezza rice who gave a symbol speech in cairo, talking about how u.s. policy in the millie's has long favored stability over democracy. she stated that the new doctrine of the bush administration was

that they would favor democracy in these countries. there was a point of time where mixed signals were sent to democratic activists in these countries, the arab countries and capitals. the groundwork for what we're seeing as a series of revolutions was laid during the bush administration and fall about a speech by president obama. now i think what we're seeing from the white house and state department and pentagon is the that i don't think anyone believes they can control what is going on in the middle east right now. they are trying to remain engaged in a way that the democratic movement emerges from this period of tumult, that the u.s. will be seen as a friendly player who wants to help and not hinder what is going on. more host:, an independent caller from new york. -- mark, an independent caller.

caller: much influence to the united states have in these people fighting for their freedom? what do you think that president obama decided to help them and go against allies that had been there for years and years, who have been suppressing the extreme islamists? now those leaders are out and you don't know what we'll have. guest: i was there for the first gulf war when the iraqis were pushed out of kuwait. it was overwhelming support for america. america was seen as the one country that could do something. there was pro-american graffiti on the walls of the embassy in kuwait. to give you a sense of the steam -- what esteem americans were held at the time. i think you've seen a waning of

american influence and mixed signals. u.s.-supported some of these leaders who were unpopular. there was always a sense of a choice between an autocratic leaders like mubarak in egypt or islam as extremists. it has gotten very hard, for the u.s. to make clear its position. i will say that i think this administration -- if this hadn't administration -- but this administration had decided to back the bar, he would still be in power. hi think lingering in the state department and in the white house's-was the lack of intervention that occurred when

the iranian people tried to interfere effused back and they were pretty well squashed by the iranian regime. i think you have to look at european interests. and it was really the french and the british wanted an ally as they go to go in and do something against gaddafi. there were people let the pentagon advising against this. each country has been a case by case basis. i think what the administration has realized is that this is a jeanie des you cannot put back in the bottle. trying tomply shepherd this process as best they can, even though it is likely to be claimed as the regime.

host: we are talking to jennifer crittendon, greg myre, husband and wife team. they understand you were just talking to secretary gates. guest: yes, secretary gates has a long history and relishes it with libya because he was debbie director of the cia -- deputy director of the cia, in the 1980's. he was definitely trying to caution against regime change in libya because he saw how difficult it was. one of the firm lines he has drawn is no grown troops in an african or middle eastern country.

and he also cautioned the of the day on capitol hill that regime change often takes 10 years, as we have seen in iraq. host: we will go to andrew in florida. caller: i just want to make a quick comment about educational causes and university in the states. with the news media, how is it possible to be a more current events? when you came back to the states and went to a friend -- went to friends and family and tried to describe the situation, the older generations -- was in the older generations or the denver generations that could not complete?

guest: i actually think that this .. which really gives you an updated look at the israeli conflict would be great in conference. -- in classrooms. [laughter] there are many people who have followed this conflict for a long time and it answers a lot of key questions. my experience, after going to the pentagon and i have spoken to a lot of military personnel, i am amazed at how much americans know about as a result of our military involvement in iraq.

i am amazed how smart. at one .1.five million people serve in iraq and afghanistan in the last decade and have come back with a sophisticated lawrence of arabia understanding of the complicated face of the middle east. i am amazed at the level of debate in the united states. i am not disappointed are all in terms of people understanding. >> guest: one character point. there are fewer american journalists in the united states today than there were on 9/11 and that has to do with the economics of newspapers and television but pretty startling fact given dramatic u.s. involvement. >> guest: having correspondents to the newspaper, the cost of having you in israel and palestine. >> you need people to help support you.

you need translators. we needed an armored car. >> host: security? >> guest: not really. we had an armored car and jackets. [talking over each other] >> host: bureaus would have to have probably thousands of dollars a day in security personnel. >> guest: right. it was easier with the israelis and palestinians. they were not targeting journalists. they did not like our opinions and our stories but they were not targeting you. in iraq and afghanistan journalists have required very extensive help to operate. >> host: we go to democrats in maryland. >> caller: how are you? i was wondering if you could talk about whether or not in your book, and is still large part of your earlier conversation.

i read jay post and peretz each morning and a bunch of other stuff of the things i look at. i am surprised how diverse the discussion is inside the middle east particularly in israel regarding the different views held even by israelis. they seem to have a broader and more diverse discussion that you often hear here. i was wondering if you get into in your books the sort of both sides of the discussion that is happening in israel that is reflected in the israeli press? >> guest: we absolutely do. the point you made is a verbatim what we said many times. the paper you mention is very liberal israeli newspaper and a very good one. jay post is the web site, jerusalem post on the

conservative side and israel. both of them eager to a very lively, well-informed discussions, articles, opinion pieces, great pieces of information. it did strike us the kind of fare that is part of the animated daily discussion in israel is often lacking in the u.s.. if it comes down to a litmus test of are you with us or against the kind of discussion. you are looking at absolutely the right forces and getting a range of opinions and i wish we would see those kind of debate in the u.s.. >> guest: what is also important is the characters that we paint and introduce you to our people within israeli and palestinian society who aren't going with the flow. we have a chapter about an israeli who goes around the west bank monitoring the development of settlements and extension of settlements and as a former religious jew who decided this

was his calling. he is not the norm in israel but is an important voice. on the palestinian side we have a chapter about a key gunman in the al aqsa martyrs brigade during the intifada. we talk about interviews we had with him and the turning point ready thoughts the palestinian uprising had failed and what arafat had done was caused the failure. these debates are documented in the characters we introduce you to in the book. >> host: help us decipher this headline in the wall street journal. washington quietly hopes of lebron on on delivery. u.s. shipments to lebanon after the collapse of the country's government in january undermining growing concerns about has belote's roll. >> guest: what we see in lebanon which is always a confusing

complicated political story is effectively hezbollah is in control of the government. >> host: for a democratic process. >> guest: lebanon has had elections. the prime minister is aligned with hezbollah. i was surprised to see this headline coming up now as opposed to a couple months ago when has a lot -- hezbollah was in charge of the government. the u.s. was very supportive of a pro-western government which has changed and now they don't want to send arms to lebanon. they are concerned where that could go. it could go to hezbollah which is very hostile towards israel. we witnessed two wars. one in 1996 and another in 2006 where israel and hezbollah were fighting across that border and there is concern that another

war could happen. >> host: back in 2006 the war between israel and hezbollah sparked by hezbollah kidnapping two israeli soldiers. we spent 32 days documenting the outgoing israeli artillery shells and the reason washington was sending arms to the lebanese government is to create a counterbalance through hezbollah who were getting their arms from syria and iran so we wanted to beef up the strength of the lebanese government but now that hezbollah is the lebanese government it would be foolhardy -- you are seeing catching up to the political changes that have happened on the ground. >> host: back to the middle east because the associated press is reporting and man with an explosive belt arrested when trying to enter the office of the largest opposition group. what is happening in jordan and how does that factor into the

situation? >> guest: jordan to be personal just like all the countries surrounding is real, is a tinderbox. we have seen protests which are extremely unusual in the jordanian capital. normally you have the king of jordan and the marquee. from monarchies is doing better than other families that have held onto power. the king of jordan has been able to hold things together and there have been protests but they have been relatively mild compared to some. what you are seeing, the problem with the jordan is there is a town in jordan which is very radical and in iraq you remember zarqawi who was one of the leaders of al qaeda and iraq

that the military killed. zarqa is a town that is a major recruiting capital for al qaeda. it may look sleepy and jordan looks very sleepy under the king but there's a lot going on. the fact that you have a suicide bomber going into the opposition offices, the tension between the protesters, radical islamists and those who are trying to hold off the power. >> host: the ap reports the italian foreign minister says italian opposition occupied -- recognize the libyan occupational transitional council. let's go to san juan. peter is independent. >> caller: my point is as long as they are playing hardball, that is what creates more hostility. it could go on and on forever.

my other point, very concerned in the world, not just the u. s for the european union. your guests have not touched on that out all. last few weeks, gadhafi, 3,000 apiece. 1 50,000 army personnel, mostly chad pirates, army personnel from somalia. he will release them to europe. he is paying $300 for each person killed. >> host: let's take your last point. >> guest: we heard a lot about the mercenaries to begin with. i am not sure -- is not clear to me how extensive their role is or how effective they are.

i will let my wife answer that. >> guest: in terms of the mercenaries, ones who are encircling gadhafi are protecting him and the reason he is holding on to tripoli, the capital right now. i heard reports about him and i don't know what will happen after the fighting ends for the fighting ends in libya whether they will be unleashed on europe. but i can tell you about a very interesting town in eastern libya that has well-documented radical town that should be watched very closely. it is a town called czar not z --zar --zarna. there was a very interesting sign at the time where they found all the paperwork of all the suicide bombers detonating themselves in iraq and found 19%

of them kept details and home phone numbers and addresses. 19% of them came from one village, one town in libya. they didn't know why. my colleague went to darna in 2008 and documented a very anti-american atmosphere and showed how our car was improving in this libyan town. there are a lot of libyan recruits in afghanistan fighting american forces in afghanistan. these are things that have to be watched because a chaotic libya, if libya turns into somalia, a failed regime that is a very dangerous situation in the current war against al qaeda. >> host: once you to comment on this headline. violence is key over the koran

burning in florida. >> guest: your heard general david petraeus make a part with appeal for calm because of this pastor in florida who took upon himself to burn korans. it is an incendiary thing to do and it has led to deaths in the un compound. there were seven civilians who were killed by a raging mob two days ago. this is a serious situation. it is hard to understand how this pastorate in florida can justify burning korans when we have 1,000 u.s. troops in afghanistan in harm's way. >> host: "this burning land" learning lessons from the front lines of the transformer israeli-palestinian conflict. it has pictures of victories and personal stories. thank you very much, greg myre and jennifer griffin. we appreciate it.

>> that with jennifer griffin and greg myre, authors of "this burning land" who appeared on washington journal. for more information visit booktv.org. >> professor paul halliday, what is habeas corpus? >> habeas corpus is not only a writ which meant 300 years ago that it was a scrap of parchment that a judge sent to a jailer. ordering matt jailer to bring a named prisoner into his court and along with it what was called a return also had to be on parchment. explained why the jail was holding that prisoner. more than a scrap of parchment even 300 years ago and certainly today habeas corpus stands in our minds not only in lawyers's minds for the idea that no one should be held, constrained in

any way against their will by someone else without the loss supervising that constrained in the person of a judge being sure it is okay. >> how did the concept of habeas corpus developed? >> i emphasize the liberal piece of parchment because really habeas corpus is a legal device long before it is an idea that you and i associate with the great writ of liberty or one of the fundamental means by which we insure freedom from constrained. a very common form of process. when you stop to think of it courts are commonly dealing with people who have to be in front of them. [talking over each other] >> that is right. courts are always calling people and there are lots of instruments called habeas corpus calling you into court to testify because you owe somebody

did that. it is ironic that this very humdrum instrument of daily court activity should be associated with ideas of human freedom and how laws must realize that. >> how did you use it? >> in lots of ways. the most interesting thing, a much greater variety than we associate with the rich today. people would have been bailed for father a bastard child or not paying their taxes or laughing in church. people would have been impressed in the navy illegally. your spouse who has been beaten and locked up by your husband, anyone of these might have been occasions for using a writ of habeas corpus to be sure someone didn't constrained against the

law. >> wasn't taking's right? >> really important point. those of us who know about habeas corpus, we call it the great writ of liberty. and ultimately it is about liberty of the kind that you and i associate with that word. 400 years ago people did have the same ideas about liberty. what they did have were notions of sovereignty. sovran was literally an individual being, the change. this work not to address the claim of the prisoner that my liberty was violated but it was really about 1 officer of the king major the second officer didn't disobey the king. it was important to make sure he

behaves. one of the things that a rewritten history of habeas corpus shows is the prisoner isn't really the focus of the rich. the jailer is. >> how did the concept of habeas corpus developed in american society? early revolutionary society? how did it make its way to our constitution? >> there are a couple ways to think about that. first is the extensive experience we had in north america. all the other british colonies around the globe in the eighteenth century prior to our independence and the experience in colonial courts and caribbean courts, we have to remember that americans are partaking of and experience that british colonialists are having all over the globe. it finds the way into u.s. law largely through that practice. in other words through the

silent accommodation of english common law more generally in to american judicial practice. the other interesting way it finds its way into our law is in the constitution, the suspension claus. that is a clause that puzzles historians and lawyers and has puzzled than in recent years because in a lot of ways it brings habeas corpus into our law negatively by saying when it is habeas corpus wouldn't be available. doesn't say habeas corpus is part of the law. it seems to assume the presence of habeas corpus in american law. >> who made sure that within the constitution? >> we don't really know. this is one of the things that has been so interesting in recent years as u.s. courts are asking questions about the nature -- the typical practice for you escorts when they want to get a lot of history on the piece of the constitution the first thing you do is read the

diaries and other accounts from the constitutional convention of philadelphia in 1787 but there are probably only a couple dozen lines totally. two or three speakers who speak to the question of habeas corpus during the convention itself at least from the records that we have. so it is hard to lay this on a particular person or a particular impulse. instead of better way to think about how this comes in our constitution is it was widely assumed to be part of the common law that was going to be carried into american law by virtue of having been part of the praxis colonial britain and american citizens were going to have in their own law. >> civil war, habeas corpus is suspended. any other times in our history? >> i can't speak to that. i want to be clear, and want to

pull back and say i have written strictly about the english and imperial history. i didn't want to write about the american history in part because other people have written about it quite extensively and in part because i think they have done so successfully and my point was we had misunderstood the english imperial prehistory. to answer your question, habeas corpus was only formally suspended during the civil war. there have been other moment in american history especially during world war ii when the way the rich was used or not used was controversial and has continued to be controversial. one of the interesting things about recent jurisprudence on habeas corpus has been how american courts have generally, because those american decisions have run in countervailing directions have wanted to reach over and passed those american

experiences back into the english experience to see if there is some kind of irreducible colonel of the rich's history that you can get out of it. >> paul halliday the digital let's take that to your 2008 -- what kind of history did you invoke in that? it was used in a supreme court case. >> that is right. i want to be sure your listeners know that i worked on that with a marvelous colleague from law school, ted white, in large part because he knew the american side. i was a specialist in english in the imperial practice and i have been thinking about that practice and i knew given what had been going on, let's just get it out with guantanamo. that the english practice was of enormous interest in u.s. courts and to my mind they didn't fully understand its history. i started writing about this

with my colleague ted. we have to work together on this. i can break this and he can put this into a form connected to american jurisprudence and that is what we did in that article and what ultimately justice kennedy in the 2008 decision cited the article because we were able to connect the ideas i just mentioned from the english experience, it is premised on the king's authority. it is not about the unquestionable authority of the judge to question any jailer handling any person anywhere. that was the central premise justice kennedy lived on out of that review article and the corollary to that was critically that the key thing was historically by being concerned with the jailers and not so much

with where they were, the question about whether or not an american jail was in guantanamo or philadelphia was less interesting than whether the jailor was supposed to answer to you escorts and oversight and at that point the english history going back centuries the idea of the king comes in to play. >> what is the image on your cover? >> it is a magnificent image from the 1780s. a prisoner is being brought in. interestingly that is the image of the husband of a woman who had been constrained by him as well. in a way it is a kind of doppelganger image of the way in which the court supervised and constrained. he has been constrained for

having previously illegally constrained his wife. one of the things i love about that image and it ended up on the cover is you have the justices sitting on the bench and looking down and literally binding the jailers as they bring in the hapless prisoner who may actually rightly be held in this case by those jailer's but that is one of the things you learn about habeas corpus. is that often prisoners are quite legally held. is not a get out of jail free cards. >> with the speaker at the history of -- >> i teach english legal history as a survey course to undergraduates which is a lot of them. and i teach graduate students in early modern british history but particularly legal history. >> through the law school. teaching all those courses windido you find time to write?

>> i'm not sure whether ice am proud or embarrassed that i spend ten years working on that book. i started before guantanamo. this was a project that came out of questions strictly from within what historians call the historiography. what other questions for which we don't have good answers? that is a way of saying you fit in time to write and in this project much more significantly time to do the research. one of the keys to this project was i literally went and studied the writs themself which no one had ever before examined. that was the foundation for writing a book about something, about a topic that had often been written about before and coming to very different insights about it. historians's i light up when we

talk about archives. it was quite remarkable when i was in the archive and realize from the condition of the files, bundles of parchment, hundreds of them at any given year with writs of habeas corpus in them. there was a senior, and animals in new court stringing together all these riches and at the end of the year the courts would tie at of so it would be so tight that you could only read in the thing on top. hundred could not be read. that was a signed and no one had open these up in 2, 3, 4 centuries. when you see that and realize here is as yet unrealized opportunity, the real issue in terms of time was finding time to go to london, finding time after you come back to make

sense after reading for thousands of these things what does it add up to? the time is between teaching the occasional semester away from and teaching. >> was the earliest reference to habeas corpus? >> i didn't search out any original moment because i knew that would probably be searching for a timer i would never find. what i really knew, i worked on fourteenth century and fifteenth century rolls and files but that was largely to establish going farther back, longer trajectory that i knew is radically transformed in the decades right around 1600. it is in those decades around 1600 that much of the research in terms of the heavier focus got to work. >> finally if you were to sell this book for a general