Jul 9th, 2008
Posted by Suzanne Ito, ACLU at 1:18pm	National Security

Like Rearranging the Deck Chairs on the…Well, You Know

So all three amendments to the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, a.k.a. the end of your Fourth Amendment rights, have failed. We now wait for the Senate to return from lunch so they can put the final nail in privacy's coffin. Ouch.

Today, Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU's Washington Legislative Office, said it best today in Huffington Post:

This [new legislation] represents a fundamental shift in the notions of freedom and democracy that have defined our nation for well over 200 years. Americans will no longer have any expectation of privacy in our communications - leading many to be fearful about what they say and write so it is not misconstrued by some computer data mining program or overzealous government agent.

That fearfulness is what we often refer to as the "chilling effect," something anyone who has traveled on an airplane since 9/11 knows very well. I was once sitting on plane waiting for it to taxi to the gate, chatting on my phone to my cousin about work, and the word "terrorist" nearly escaped my lips. I did catch myself, but that's the chilling effect. It's self-censorship, and thanks to Congress's capitulation today to the White House, all Americans who talk on the phone or email will know it well.

So say good-bye to the Fourth Amendment. Nice knowin' ya!

Permalink |	National Security

1. Jsimon04 Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 12:26pm

   Is it possible that there could be some kind of judiciary action to review the constitutionality of this legislation?

2. Matt Bors Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 12:28pm

   Aaah, the 4th. What a fine amendment that was. The good ones always die young. (or get killed by a capitulating Congress).

3. Noam Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 1:56pm

   It's clear that we can't entrust democracy to our elected officials. What a bunch of clowns.

4. Roberta Beach Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 2:15pm

   "And you all know, security is mortals' chiefest enemy."
   --William Shakespeare, from "MacBeth"

   "That there is much to be done remains unquestioned; that there is much now seriously threatened no one in his senses could deny. . .Indeed it would seem part of the very minimum of moral sanity today to keep in mind firmly that, however tragic and far-reaching the interregnum through which we are passing, it is an interregnum. . ."
   --Irwin Edman, from "Candle in the Dark," 1939

5. Richard Landon Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 4:59pm

   I always operated under the assumption( or maybe the misconception) that Congress could not legislate away a Constitutional right. Does this mean that no law could be written that did away with the Bill of Rights? I'm speaking specifically of the 4th amendment in this thread, of course.

   So what happens next? Once King George deigns to sign this excresence, it becomes law and then can be challenged by...by whom? What about the issues of standing in this instance? I hate to think the political party that I used to belong to (the D) is going to knuckle under so easily to this despotic executive.

   So..what do we do now???

6. Fred Lester Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 9:46pm

   The ACLU wants to remove the second amendment, why can't congress remove the fourth. Both groups are made up of a bunch of wind sock liberals and RINOS. the ACLU is a self serving organization of communists.

7. Jason Allen Says:
   Jul 9th, 2008 at 10:22pm

   I find it hard to express the sorrow I feel at the direction our elected officials have chosen FOR us. I wish I could believe they have our best interest at heart. I wish I could believe this country still ran on the principal: "By the people, for the people". I cannot believe this is the will of the American people, a large percentage of wich correspond to friends and relatives outside the United States daily. We should not have to rip democracy from the people entrusted to protect it, but power corrupts, we know this. I love my country, I despise my country's policymakers. I suggest we find the guption to take the power back and distribute it equally amongst ALL Americans via weekly votes presented in layman's terms over the internet,tv,radio,and phone. Rise up America, remember, we used to get upset over tea tarrifs.

8. Citizen Mark Says:
   Jul 10th, 2008 at 12:43am

   UNREAL. The United States Senate actually flushed the 4th amendment. I fear for my children.

   Another chilling question is why a lame duck president is so adamant about getting this through while he's still in power. We are witnessing the decline of our great nation.

   Are there no champions??

9. David Plylar Says:
   Jul 10th, 2008 at 6:05am

   These days it is hard to work up a gasp when our Reichstag sucks more life out of the Constitution. However, I had to gulp for air yesterday during the FISA debate when Oran Hatch announced the 4th Amendment only protected people from "unreasonable" searches; he said the 4th said nothing about the government needing a warrant to conduct a search.
   The scary thing about Hatch's
   statement is his interpretation is arguable! It all depends on the meaning of "and" which separates the concept of "unreasonable" searches from the provision for warrants.
   This got me to thinking about how we interpret the 2nd Amendment (Full disclosure: I'm a card-carrying member of the ACLU and the NRA). Gun advocates focus attention on the last half of the 2nd; opponents of guns focus on the first half--the part about militias.
   Compound this legal parsing with ignorance and our liberty is in even more peril. When CIA Director Michael V. Hayden was being grilled by the Senate Judiciary committee before his confirmation, he declared he was an expert on the 4th Amendment and it had no provision for "probable cause" being a precondition for the issuance of a warrant. Still more unsettling, the senator who challenged his assertion did not follow up; he took Hayden's statement as gospel!!!

10. nehemiah Says:
    Jul 10th, 2008 at 7:06am

    so must all good things come to an end.

11. nehemiah Says:
    Jul 10th, 2008 at 7:13am

    so, must all good things come to an end -before we head to hell in a hand basket.

12. ondelette Says:
    Jul 10th, 2008 at 7:59am

    I guess I'll beat at my drum again here. The bill contains a dangerous provision with respect to redefining the expression Weapons of Mass Destruction.

    Since that section of the bill will survive a constitutional challenge to the targeting and continuation that the ACLU and EFF are planning to challenge, and since the bill contains that ritual clause making each clause independent of any challenge to another, I guess we now live in a world where just about anyone can be a proliferator of WMD if the government merely says so.

    I've attracted zero interest in those clauses (Sec 110). I guess they aren't important, until we end up with many times the number of detainees we currently have, many times the number of wars we currently have, and everybody under surveillance -- with warrants -- on grounds that they are purveyors of WMD.

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