Lies the government told you by Andrew Napolitano (big screen ebook reader .TXT) 📕

the surveillance is foreign, not that there is evidence to induce a judicial conclusion that the target is involved in any activity which could be a threat to national security.

The Act also provided the same requirements for physical as well as electronic surveillance. If the requirements for a criminal case were based on FISA, this would mean that if the police wanted to search your house because they suspected you of criminal conduct, all that the officers would have to establish is that there was probable cause to believe that you were you and your house was your house. It would not even have to be certain, just probable, that they were right. Yet somehow, the federal government in the administration of President Jimmy Carter successfully sold the idea to the country that the Act would protect liberties and ensure privacy. And we believed it because of the Cold War, because of the fear of the Soviet Union, because we wanted to be safe, and because we wanted to believe that the government could protect us. We forgot about the right to be left alone.

Good-bye Liberty, Hello Tyranny

While the Sedition Acts and FISA claimed to protect Americans and provide us with both liberty and security, they were just the prologue to our current debacle. And it all began, as do most roads to tyranny, with a terrible disaster, a horrible action that spawned the government-hoped-for reaction. On September 11th 2001, New York City, Washington, D.C., and Shankville, Pennsylvania, were the scenes of one of the most horrific tragedies of our history. We were attacked by those who resented our presence in their countries and while our country stood still, sadness and shock emanating throughout, the federal government chose to help terrorists cause more American suffering by diminishing the liberty that makes America so great. The Bush Administration, within only weeks of the tragedy, had drafted the Patriot Act of 2001.

The Patriot Act sailed through Congress with little opposition. It was a well-contrived acronym that inspired visions of the Founding Fathers fighting for freedom. And so nobody seemed to notice or care that it actually takes from the people each of the cherished freedoms for which so many fought and died. The Act tramples the constitutional rights of law-abiding American citizens by snooping into their private communications and personal records. It also expands the power of federal agencies, allowing searches and seizures without a warrant and without any probable cause. It allows for the detainment of people without lawyers for indefinite periods, often solely on the baseless suspicions of one or another federal agent. And it can do all this in secret, without public or judicial scrutiny.

Sadly, considering the constitutional impact of the Patriot Act, one would think that Congress would have spent a little more time debating its various provisions. And maybe it would have, if any congressperson had bothered to read it and consider the implications. But while claiming to be working for the people and asserting that it protects us from unconstitutional laws, Congress did not fight it even a little.

The Patriot Act was introduced on October 23rd and in two days passed both the House and the Senate and was signed into law on October 26th. Considering that the Act was 342 pages in very small print, it was amazing that it took less than two days for most to read it. The more amazing thing was that later most of Congress admitted never having read the Act. Our representatives passed a law that they failed to read, a law that was drafted by the top law enforcement agency, the Department of Justice. Apparently, Congress would like us to believe that it did not need to read the law it was approving, because it assumed that the top law enforcement agency would never attempt to increase its influence or power.

Probable Farce

Most of the Patriot Act amended preexisting laws, one of them being FISA. With its amendments, the Act quickly and easily rid FISA of the few protections it contained against total government interference in our personal liberties. Prior to the amendment, the FISA secret courts could only grant a warrant when the “primary purpose” of the search was to gather intelligence from foreign powers. Now, the secret courts can grant warrants when the purpose of foreign intelligence gathering is a “significant purpose”7 of the surveillance. And “foreign power” was amended to “foreign person.” Never mind that the Constitution protects the liberties of all persons, citizens and aliens, domestic and foreign, residents and strangers, saints and thugs; the Patriot Act purports to change that.

So anyone who the government decides might at some point yield information that will link the government to foreign intelligence can be snooped on, without their knowledge, and without even a shred of evidence to link them to criminal activity. The best part is that if any evidence of criminal activity not linked to foreign intelligence is discovered during these fishing expeditions, the government must pass that information on to another agency permitted to use it in criminal prosecution.8

Basically, if the federal government is wrong, and you have absolutely no connection to any foreign power, at least the resources are not wasted if they can find some other criminal activity to pin on you; too bad for your constitutional rights. Even if we believe that it is only the so-called War on Terror that is keeping us safe, we cannot keep letting the government tell us that it is okay for us to give up the Constitution in exchange for the promise of security.

The Supreme Court held in the case of Texas v. Stanford (1965) that the government may not constitutionally issue general warrants that do not describe with particularity the place to be searched or the things to be seized.9 This requirement of specificity is an inherent part of the Fourth Amendment and protects against fishing expeditions by the local or state police or federal agents. Or at least it did, until