FC: Bob Corn-Revere on anti-terrorism laws: Freedom vs. Fear

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

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From: "Corn-Revere, Robert L." <CornRevere () hhlaw com>
To: "Declan McCullagh (E-mail)" <declan () well com>
Subject: Freedom v. Fear
Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 10:36:24 -0500

http://www5.law.com/lawcom/displayid.cfm?statename=DC&docnum=102784&table=news&flag=full

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   By Robert Corn-Revere
   Legal Times

   The war against terrorism is a war to preserve freedom, we are told.
   The president explained that the terrorists "hate us for our freedoms
   -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote
   and assemble and disagree with each other."

   But even as he spoke, the Federal Bureau of Investigation was rounding
   up an undisclosed number of people for indeterminate periods of
   detention, and the attorney general has refused to release any
   substantive information on the practices. In defending these and other
   actions before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Dec. 6, Attorney
   General John Ashcroft claimed that those who ask whether we are
   sacrificing too much freedom "only aid terrorists, for they erode our
   national unity and diminish our resolve."

   If irony is not dead, it surely is on life support.

   In a two-week period in October, the Justice Department announced a
   policy authorizing the interception of attorney-client conversations
   with detainees, a program of profiling and interviewing thousands of
   Arab men, and the creation of secret military tribunals to try
   immigrants and other foreigners suspected of terrorism.

   More significant than these executive actions was Congress' passage of
   the anti-terrorism bill -- the USA Patriot Act -- signed by President
   George W. Bush on Oct. 26. While some parts of the act provided needed
   adjustments to the law, its far-reaching provisions affect the rights
   of all citizens, and not just terrorism suspects. For example, the act
   minimizes judicial supervision of telephone and Internet surveillance,
   expands the government's ability to conduct secret searches, and gives
   the attorney general and the secretary of state the power to designate
   domestic groups as "terrorist organizations." The law also gives the
   FBI broad access to sensitive medical, financial, mental health, and
   educational records about individuals without having to show evidence
   of a crime and without a court order.

   [...]




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