Rootsie

Can others take a cue from this?

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/032505F.shtml

Left-Right Coalition Rises to Oppose USA Patriot Act Provisions
   By Abid Aslam
   OneWorld US

   Friday 25 March 2005

   Washington - A novel coalition of conservatives and liberals normally at each other's throats over the nature of government and free speech have made common cause to oppose key parts of the USA Patriot Act anti-terrorism law.

   The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), long vilified by conservatives, has joined forces with right-wing groups the American Conservative Union, Americans for Tax Reform, and the Free Congress Foundation to spearhead the "Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances" coalition.

   The Patriot Act's supporters have said it has kept America safe since 2001 but opponents have said the law is intrusive and threatens to let the government spy on innocent Americans. The new coalition will lobby Congress to roll back provisions allowing law enforcement agents to look at library users' records and to conduct unannounced searches of homes and private offices.

   "Checks and balances are absolutely essential, even and especially during times of threat," said coalition leader Bob Barr, a former Republican Congressman from Georgia who voted for the law in 2001. "Our message is universal. Liberty is not divisible, even in the face of terrorism, and we must not allow any part of it to be sacrificed in our efforts to defeat acts of terrorism."

   Administration and Justice Department officials have said that the law contains strong civil liberties safeguards and that no civil liberties complaints have been filed against the legislation itself. Rather, they said, many of the complaints offered by civil libertarians have nothing to do with the law's provisions.

   The coalition came together to prevent politicians from branding Patriot Act opponents un-American or suggesting they are willing to help terrorists, as happened when the law first was debated, coalition members said at a news conference.

   "We don't want this argument to be obscured by those who would suggest that anyone who is for more and more government power is somehow on the side of the right, and those who are against it or are skeptical of such grants are on the side of the wrong," said David Keene of the American Conservative Union. "This is an important question for all Americans on the left, the right, or in the middle."

   Key Patriot Act provisions are scheduled to expire on Dec. 31. The Senate and House Judiciary committees plan to open hearings in the next month on whether they should be renewed.

   The coalition focused on three of the law's most controversial provisions, asking that the wording of each be clarified to limit its scope to fighting terrorists and to prevent law enforcement agencies from using the law to silence dissent or go on fishing expeditions.

   It urged that a provision giving agencies access to library, medical, and gun purchase records be modified to require law enforcement officials to present evidence to a federal judge supporting a link with suspected terrorism before warrants are served.

   It sought similar limits on a provision allowing so-called "sneak and peek" searches of homes, businesses, and personal property without property owners' or residents' knowledge and with warrants delivered afterwards.

   And it asked that the language of a provision allowing surveillance of protests be rewritten to require a definite connection with suspected terrorism.

   "The Patriot Act went too far, too fast, and now is the time to determine what freedoms have been unnecessarily lost in the name of national security," said the ACLU's Laura Murphy. "Now is the time for Congress to restore those freedoms."

   Short for the "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001," the USA Patriot Act originally passed by 357-66 in the House of Representatives and 98-1 in the Senate.

   President George W. Bush's administration proposed the law, shepherded it through Congress, and enacted it in the immediate aftermath of the Sep. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the U.S. Senate's evacuation because of anthrax.

   The measure passed with neither chamber issuing the usual reviews of proposed legislation. "As a result, it lacks background legislative history that often retrospectively provides necessary statutory interpretation," according to a detailed analysis of the law prepared by the Washington, D.C.-based Electronic Privacy Information Center.

   Bush and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, whose powers the law has greatly expanded, have called for the act's renewal. Gonzales has suggested that provisions expanding the government's surveillance and prosecutorial powers against suspected terrorists, their associates, and financiers should be strengthened.

   "Debate about government exercise of powers that might infringe upon privacy or civil liberties, I think that's an appropriate debate," Gonzales told a recent meeting of the National Association of Counties. "But it's got to be a real debate, one based on facts. And I've yet to hear a strong argument as to why the Patriot Act should not be reauthorized."

   The coalition faces a difficult fight in making changes to the law, Barr told reporters. The ACLU's Murphy, however, said grassroots opposition to the law is growing.

   Some 375 local and state governments representing more than 56 million Americans have passed resolutions opposing the law or some of its provisions, the ACLU said.

   While many of these resolutions have no practical effect, proponents have said the measures serve to notify federal policymakers and agencies of public disapproval. Most of the resolutions called upon Congress to bring the Patriot Act back in line with the Constitution.

   Foreign governments also have looked askance at the law, which gave the government new authority to collect information not only about U.S. citizens but also about visitors to the United States.

   Last year, Latin American countries objected to sending census data and voter records to U.S. law enforcement agencies and Canadian officials warned that complying with the Patriot Act would violate Canadian law.

   Other groups in the new coalition include the American Policy Center, Citizens' Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, the Second Amendment Foundation, and the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.

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