The decision by a federal appeals court requiring the Obama administration to release its legal rationale for killing American citizens abroad with drones is right in both law and principle.

The administration cannot both claim to have national security reasons for keeping secret the memorandum and the discretion to selectively reveal its contents.

Furthermore, the people of this country have the right to understand how the administration constitutionally justifies the killing of one of its citizens, Anwar al-Awlaki, in a 2011 drone strike in Yemen.

The ruling comes out of a New York Times Freedom of Information Act lawsuit in which the newspaper and two of its reporters sought the legal justification for the targeted killing.

The document at the heart of the case was written by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Though the document has not been released, The Times published a story about it in 2011 based on accounts from people who had read it.

The memorandum said the killing of the radical Muslim cleric would be legal only if it weren’t feasible to take al-Awlaki alive, according to the Times story.

The killing was further justified because al-Awlaki seemingly was participating in the war between the U.S. and al-Qaeda and was a threat to Americans.

Protections against the killing of a citizen without judicial due process are found in the Bill of Rights as well as federal law and an executive order that prohibits assassinations.

A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit was right to order the administration to reveal the exact rationale it employed in killing al-Awlaki.

It is unclear at this point when the memorandum will be released since the government could appeal the ruling to the full appeals court or ultimately the U.S. Supreme Court.

But it should. U.S. citizens have a right to understand and perhaps challenge the rationale their government employs in deciding when it’s appropriate to take one of their lives.