Politech mailing list archives
FC: Spending bills include controversial Net-legislation
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Date: Fri, 06 Oct 2000 10:05:19 -0400
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,39289,00.html Capitol Rush to Sign Tech Bills by Declan McCullagh (declan () wired com) 3:00 a.m. Oct. 6, 2000 PDT WASHINGTON -- With only a few days left before Congress adjourns for the year, negotiations over controversial tech bills are intensifying. Since it's an election year, legislators are itching to go home to campaign, but they're far behind in their work: Squabbling between Democrats and Republicans has resulted in only two of 13 annual spending bills being signed into law. But while the partisan divide is public, many details about what will be included in the appropriations bills are not. Committees meet behind locked doors to negotiate, and rank-and-file legislators often aren't given time to review the final bill before they vote on it. "Legislative proposals that have a dramatic impact on individual liberty are attached without hearing, debate or an opportunity to amend in an open process," says Greg Nojeim, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "For example, as I speak to you, the Customs Service is trying to obtain the authority to open all outbound mail without a warrant." Nojeim is talking about a bill backed by Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Alabama). It would amend existing law, which currently says the feds can't open letters "except under authority of a search warrant." Legislators also have inserted a mandatory Internet-filtering amendment, backed by Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) and Rep. Ernst Istook (R-Oklahoma), into the appropriations bill funding the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education departments. Libraries and civil liberties groups had lobbied hard for its removal, but negotiators did precisely the opposite, expanding the bill's scope to require any school or library that receives almost any kind of federal funds to adopt filtering software. Making it more difficult than usual to defeat such a plan is that the appropriations procedure is not handled by the usual committees, like Commerce and Judiciary, that specialize in tech issues. Advocates like the Center for Democracy and Technology don't know as many aides or legislators involved in this process -- and they're trying to work the phones at the same time as every other lobbyist in town. "The nature of the beast is that many of us know the people who cover Internet issues on a substantive, day-to-day basis (and not) the people who appropriate money. Appropriations is an arcane world unto itself in Washington," says CDT staff counsel Alan Davidson. "There are many people who specialize in getting things through the appropriations process specifically," he said. "It's a high-stakes game for many companies, and it's not an area where public interest groups have had much of an impact, especially in the Internet area." CDT sent out an action alert on Wednesday, trying to rally opposition to the filtering requirement: "CDT needs your help to prevent this misguided and unconstitutional legislation from becoming law!" There's plenty of precedent for hastily crafted legislation to become law in the waning days of a congressional session. The Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act -- which requires telephone companies to make their networks easily wiretappable -- became law during the last week of the 1994 Congress. CALEA is currently the subject of an ongoing lawsuit brought by privacy groups. So is the Child Online Protection Act, an anti-erotica criminal law that Congress approved in late 1998 as part of an omnibus appropriations bill. A federal appeals court ruled in June that it violated the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech. [...] ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology You may redistribute this message freely if it remains intact. To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
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- FC: Spending bills include controversial Net-legislation Declan McCullagh (Oct 06)