By AMY RILEY
One Citizen's Perspective

To the shock and dismay of millions of Americans, the federal government, under direct order from Attorney General Janet Reno in the Justice Department, has loosed its considerable might via heavily armed storm troopers on peaceful civilians, who by all apparent accounts were unarmed and on private property.

The taking of Elian Gonzalez in the predawn hours Saturday morning was a travesty, and a shameful failure of the American legal system to protect the best interests of a child.

The plight of little Elian Gonzalez promises to be a heavily debated, probably lengthy, legal case, fraught with philosophical, constitutional and sociological implications that go to the very heart of this country. Etched in our collective conscience will be an indelible blemish in our nation's history of a little boy who has suffered much, suffering much again at the hands of the American government.

Elian has become a cultural icon, a patron saint of adult causes, a political pawn in an ongoing clash of ideological beliefs, and yet in truth, he is just a little boy who is the innocent victim of circumstances beyond his control, and possibly even beyond his capacity to comprehend. I am relieved that Elian has been reunited with his father, but am appalled at the method, and grieved by the fact that this boy again is suffering the abrupt loss of an important relationship in his life.

It is absolutely critical that Elian be allowed to continue a significant relationship with his relatives in Miami, most especially Marisleysis Gonzales, his cousin and primary caretaker for the last five months.

Aside from the lasting traumatic implications of the violent incursion, in which he was literally ripped at gunpoint from the arms of a family which has nurtured and loved him back to health, there is the serious long-term threat to Elian's ability to trust attachments if he is prevented from seeing Marisleysis because of the bungled manner in which this whole situation has been handled by both the Cuban and American governments. As is often the case in bitter custody disputes, it is imperative that adults on both sides of the issue put aside their personal differences in order to best serve the interests of Elian.

In retrospect, Juan Miguel, the boy's father, should have been allowed by Fidel Castro to immediately fly to Miami to retrieve his son from the hospital just days after his rescue. This would have prevented nearly all of the subsequent heartache. No doubt, Castro feared that Juan Miguel would attempt to seize the opportunity to apply for his own political asylum, not terribly likely if his new wife and infant son were left behind in communist Cuba.

Interestingly, now that Castro needs to portray the image of a happy family to procure the return of Elian, he has sent them all to the United States, a turn I hope will result in political asylum for all four members of Elian's family. In a perfect world, Juan Miguel, his wife, Elian, and his baby brother would be embraced by the exiled Cuban community in Little Havana, where Elian could be raised by his father, and still maintain close familial ties with his Miami relatives.

Somehow, though, the world doesn't seem so perfect now. Now that Elian has resided in this country for a period of time, has had a taste of freedom (and sadly, persecution), lawyers representing Elian and the Miami relatives have built a strong case for political asylum.

By all accounts, the family never wanted to deny Elian the right to be reunited with his father; they only wanted to guarantee that he wouldn't be returned to Cuba. Opponents argue that Juan Miguel, as the sole surviving parent, is the only person with jurisdiction to argue that point for Elian, but the federal court of appeals in Atlanta disagrees. The court extended the ban on Elian's removal from this country until his plea for political asylum can be heard.

Meanwhile, we may just find ourselves in the middle of another huge congressional investigation into allegations that the feds operated illegally, not to mention immorally, in their seizure of Elian from his surrogate home.

Senator Bob Smith, a Republican from New Hampshire, called the raid a “violent abuse of power.” Roger Bernstein, one of a team of attorneys representing the Miami relatives, called the operation a violation of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. He claims that federal marshals failed to “knock and announce.” The law requires that access first be denied before a door is battered down, except in special circumstances. He echoed the family's contention that to return Elian back to Cuba, without having his day in court, “to be a slave to the revolution...[would be] morally reprehensible.”

This is a case which could bring a nation to its knees, but in the heat of the battle is the heart of a boy, whose battered little soul deserves so much more.

[Comments are welcome to ARileyFreePress@aol.com[.

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