According to Kant, men cannot be used as a means to an end, even to achieve a positive action for a greater number of men and women: "For he whom I propose by such a promise to use for my own purposes cannot possibly assent to my mode of acting towards him and, therefore, cannot himself contain the end of this action. This violation of the principle of humanity in other men is more obvious if we take in examples of attacks on the freedom and property of others. For then it is clear that he who transgresses the rights of men intends to use the person of others merely as a means, without considering that as rational beings they ought always to be esteemed also as ends, that is, as beings who must be capable of containing in themselves the end of the very same action." No human being has the right to deny another human being his essential humanity, and even if the ends seem valid, transgressing the rights of men is never justified if it violates the esteem that should...

If that were the case, then the tortures of the Spanish Inquisition 'revealed' that all of the people who confessed were witches and heretics. One expert in terrorism commented that if he were placed in a 'ticking time bomb' scenario, he would have a cup of tea with someone who was likely to have information, rather than try to browbeat or torture the suspect. Torture merely makes the fanatic more resolved, and hurts an innocent person when misapplied or applied unjustly. Torturing people violates the principles of international justice that the U.S. fought to establish, principles many Americans died to protect. A nation cannot uphold the principles of justice while denying and violating those principles in practice. America will be judged, not on the basis of how she obeys her laws when it is easy to do, but during times of crisis.