The one thing that made America great - Due Process of Law. Inherited from English common law and the 1215 Magna Carta, it was enshrined in The Constitution within the Bill of Rights, specifically Amendments 1, 4, 5, and 6.
Early in our history, freedom was almost obliterated. President Adams and his Congress passed the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798, making it illegal to criticize the President in print, among other things. President Jefferson repealed the laws in 1802.
During World War One, thousands of dissenters were imprisoned, and later exonerated, when it was later decided that their free speech rights had been violated.
Cointelpro was a 1960's era clandestine operation mounted by the police apparatus, and involved gross and mass violation of citizen civil rights.
After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1996, Clinton signed the Omnibus crime bill and the Antiterrorism & Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA)....These laws reduced the due process rights of suspects... the AEDPA contained most of the provisions of the later Patriot Act.
The Patriot Act severely reduces the criteria needed before surveillance can be authorized- in many cases, absolutely no evidence of criminal wrong doing needs to be put before a Judge. Beforehand, police agents needed to compile a case before the surveillance could be approved-Now this requirement is drastically reduced or eliminated.
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The FBI can now obtain business records without any Judges authorization.
Throughout the Cold War, due process rights were freqeuntly trampled upon- if an investigation came under the heading of 'National Security' interests.
This was just an excuse which came to take on a cultic aspect- the intelligence agencies function like cults.
Section 802 " Domestic terrorism"..provision 213, 215, with 'National Security letters" sneak and peak and seizures occur which plainly violate the Constitution.
Attorney /client privileges are weakened, Judicial review watered down, and reporting requirements eliminated.
Courts have struck down several sections- 805, 505, as being unconstitutional.
Eight states and 395 cities have declared the Patriot Act illegal, and forbade their local employees, including police, from cooperating with Federal officials. ( The supremacy clause in the constitution stipulates that Federal law will always trump state and local laws, when they are in conflict. But objections to the Patriot Act are based upon its unconstitutionality, it violates the fourth Amendment, and is thus itself illegal.
The effect of the law- hundreds of arrests, but no major criminals or terrorists have been snared.
The recent Military Commissions law almost completely wipes out due process, outdoing the Patriot Act- we are almost at the end of the infamous slippery slope - the next homeland attack will bring an open declaration of Martial Law, and the junta will never return us to constitutional rule.
America is less safe because of Bush's botched war- his reckless war for oil has been the number one recruitment tool for the Jihadists....After 9-11, America had the sympathy of the whole world- a million Iranians marched in the streets of Tehran in support. Bush has thrown this sympathy away, and we are now imbroiled in a new 'hundred years war' that has already depleted our treasury. We are trapped inside the Panopticon.
( needs rewriting, correcting).
