WAKE UP!  DO SOMETHING!
YOU ARE LOSING THAT WHICH MAKES AMERICA GREAT!!!

The "War Against Terrorism" has become the War Against Freedom, Civil Liberties & Privacy... and you are losing!  This country was founded on liberty and freedom and the "Patriot" title of this Act should make you very angry!  Have we forgotten the McCarthy Era?!

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain
a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
- Benjamin Franklin

Do you know that your Federal Government now has the right to force libraries to turn over records of the material you read and check out?  And, John Ashcroft defends this act saying that it, "Ensures Liberty".  As Diane Carman recently wrote in the Denver Post [1], "Ashcroft was channeling George Orwell."  Other analogies from Orwell's "1984":

"War is Peace.
Freedom is Slavery.
Ignorance is Strength."
("1984", George Orwell)

Police are demanding records from libraries across the country... and the libraries are providing them.  Even if you ask, your library cannot tell you if your records have been divulged.  They can be prosecuted for contempt of court if they let you know!

You may say to yourself, "It's O.K.  The Act helps the FBI find middle eastern terrorists who are searching for books on how to make a bomb." But, the red flag is raised by computer programs searching for keywords.  You may innocently check out a book on "Middle East Peace" which includes keywords of "terrorism" and "bomb".  Suddenly, you appear on the FBI's library records list.  What if you use the library's computers to read the online article "Ansar Al-Islam Denies Role in U.N. Bombing".

Now, your innocent activities reveal that you were reading topics related to:
terrorism, middle east, truck bombing, FBI, U.N. assassination,
kill, Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda network, Islam, Iraq, etc.

Guess what?  You're now a target for clandestine investigation by your government!  If you say, "Surely, they would look at what I was reading and see that it was innocent"...  you may want to think again.  Mistakes are made, sometimes with horrific outcomes.  Haven't you heard of all "mistakes" made by police in drug arrests?  If not, try a search such as Google for "police killings wrong house drugs".

The USA Patriot Act is 342 pages long and was rushed through Congress following 9/11/2001.  Sufficient time was not allowed for debate of the Act.  And, any delays in its passage would have been viewed as "weak on terrorism".  Yet, no evidence was presented that current civil liberties of ordinary Americans were to blame in the terrorist attacks. [2]

The FBI & CIA now have nationwide roving wiretaps
on phones, computers, voicemail and ISP's.
All previous checks & balances ignored.

The American Library Association (ALA) has banded together to oppose the USA Patriot Act.  There is considerable previous case law to defend the privacy of library patrons [see F.R.Evid. 501; 22; WRIGHT & GRAHAM, FEDERAL PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE: EVIDENCE, §§5430, 5431 (1980 & 2002 Supp.)].  Yet, your privacy is ignored by this Act with a variety of special exclusions such as "emergency exceptions" & "foreign intelligence exceptions".  [3]

Is this article meant to scare you?  Yes!  And, we hope it succeeds!  We're scared by all the keywords that this article alone will produce for spying government agencies.  What citizens read, research or access is a fundamental matter of privacy.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers,
and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated."
(Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution)

We are experiencing a notable change in the First Amendment.  A 1943 Supreme Court ruling follows:

"The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the
vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities
and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts.
One’s right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press,
freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights
may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections."
(Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, 1943)

"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty
when the Government's purposes are beneficent.
Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion
of their liberty by evil-minded rulers.
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment
by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding."
 - Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, Olmstead v. U.S. (1928)

Please let your voice be heard!
Use our page Contact Your Government to show your opposition to this Act.

¹  "Destroying Freedoms to Save Them", Diane Carman, Denver Post, 8/24/2003
²  "EFF Analysis Of The Provisions Of The USA PATRIOT Act", Electronic Frontier Foundation, 10/31/2001.
³  "CRS Report for Congress", Charles Doyle, Senior Specialist, American Law Division, 2/26/2003.