Thanks to outrageous limits Congress placed on the transfer of Guantánamo prisoners beginning in 2010, the prisoners are still being held, with no end to their incarceration in sight. In September, a member of this stranded group, a Yemeni citizen named Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, killed himself after a federal judge’s ruling ordering his release was unfairly overturned by an appellate court. It was the kind of price a nation pays when it creates prisons like Guantánamo, beyond the reach of law and decency, a tragic reminder of the stain on American justice.

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The issue of closing Guantánamo scarcely came up in the 2012 campaign. But it was good to hear Mr. Obama recommit to his promise near the end of the race. “I still want to close Guantánamo,” he said during an interview on “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” in mid-October. “We haven’t been able to get that through Congress.”

Mr. Obama did not say how he intended to move the issue forward in his second term or break the Congressional logjam. The fact is, Guantánamo cannot be emptied without ending the Congressionally imposed restrictions on transferring prisoners to the United States; on using funds to prepare facilities on American soil that could house Guantánamo detainees; and on releasing dozens of detainees who pose no threat, if they ever did, and who have been held far too long without charges or trial.

If Mr. Obama is serious about fulfilling his pledge — and we trust he is — he needs to become more engaged this time around and be willing to spend political capital. Republicans, and some Democrats, who have helped to prevent the closing of the Guantánamo prison are implacable, and dedicated to a propagandistic argument that military justice for terrorists is somehow tougher and more reliable than civilian justice. The opposite is true, but the administration has made the case poorly.

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The damaging restrictions on dealing with terrorism suspects (and, remember, this regime of false justice amounts to a second, inferior judicial system that has applied only to Muslim prisoners) are contained in the National Defense Authorization Act, the annual military budget bill. The latest version is now being hammered out on Capitol Hill and is likely to land on the president’s desk by the end of the lame-duck session.