In a nutshell, not only has the Bush Administration undermined judicial supervision of government spying on citizens by forcing the Patriot Act in law enforcement, but it's also undermining another vital check and balance on surveillance abilities: the responsibility to Congress and the general public. 

Though this fact sheet concentrates on the immediate surveillance provisions of the Patriot Act, taxpayers must bear in mind that the action also comprises a lot of different provisions. 

What's the"USA/Patriot" Act?

The majority of the changes to surveillance law produced by the Patriot Act were a part of a longstanding law enforcement wish list which was previously rejected by Congress, sometimes repeatedly. Congress reversed course since it had been bullied into it from the Bush Administration at the terrifying weeks following the September 11 assault.                                                                               

The Senate version of the Patriot Act, which closely resembled the laws asked by Attorney General John Ashcroft, was delivered right to the ground free of discussion, disagreement, or hearings. Lots of Senators complained that they had little opportunity to read that, much less test it, before having to vote. But, without a discussion or consultation with all rank-and-file associates, the House leadership withdrew out the compromise bill and replaced it with legislation that reflected the Senate version. Neither conversation nor alterations were allowed, and once more members hardly had the time to browse the thick invoice before they were made to throw an up-or-down vote on it. The Bush Administration indicated that members that voted against it could be blamed for any additional strikes - a potent threat in a time once the state was expecting another assault to come any time and if reports of fresh anthrax letters were emerging daily.

Congress and the Administration acted with no careful or systematic attempt to ascertain whether flaws in our surveillance legislation had led to the attacks, or if the changes they were creating would help prevent additional attacks. Lots of the act's provisions have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism.

The Patriot Act increases the government's ability to spy at four regions

The Patriot Act raises government surveillance abilities in four areas:

Records hunts. It expands the government's ability to check at records on a person's action being held with a third party. 

Secret hunts. It expands the following Fourth Amendment exclusion for spying which collects"addressing" information regarding the source and destination of communications, instead of the material (Section 214).

Among the most crucial terms of the Patriot Act makes it much easier for the government to access documents of taxpayers' actions being held with a third party.

Unchecked electricity

Making things worse:

The FBI doesn't even need to demonstrate a reasonable suspicion that the documents are linked to criminal activity, much less the necessity for"probable cause" that's recorded in the Fourth Amendment into the Constitution. All the government has to do is create the broad assertion that the request is connected to an ongoing terrorism or foreign intelligence investigation.

The judicial supervision of these new forces is non-existent. The authorities should only certify to a judge - without the need for proof or evidence - that this type of hunt meets the statute of broad standards, along with the judge can't even reject the program.

Surveillance orders could be located in part on an individual's First Amendment activities, like the novels they read, the Internet sites they visit, or even a letter to the editor they've written.

An individual or organization forced to turn over documents is prohibited from disclosing the search to anyone. Because of this gag order, the topics of surveillance never find out that their records are examined by the authorities. This undercuts an important check and balance on this power: the capacity of people to challenge illegitimate hunts.

The legislation before the Patriot Act

The legislation under the Patriot Act

When will the Patriot Act be utilized?

To collect foreign intelligence or explore international terrorism

To collect foreign intelligence or shield against global terrorism

What can the FBI need to be flipped over?

"documents"

Who will they need info about?

Anyone

Who do they need it from?

Any entity (like bookstores and libraries)

Why the Patriot Act's expansion of documents hunts is unconstitutional

It Violates the Fourth Amendment, which states the government can't run a search without getting a warrant and showing probable cause to believe that the individual has committed or may commit a crime.

Violates the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech by banning the recipients of search requests by telling others about these requests, even where there's not an actual demand for secrecy.

Violates the Amendment by neglecting to give note - after the fact - to persons whose privacy was compromised. Notice is also an integral part of due process, which can be guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment.

More covert searches

For centuries, common law has demanded that the government can not enter your house without telling you, and must consequently provide you notice before it implements a search. This"knock and announce" principle has been recognized as part of this Fourth Amendment into the Constitution.

This usually means that the authorities can enter a home, office, or apartment with a search warrant once the occupants are away, search through their land, take photos, and sometimes even grab property - rather than let them afterward.

Notice is an important check on the government's electricity since it forces the government to function in the open, and permits the topic of hunts to guard their Fourth Amendment rights. By way of instance, it permits them to point out irregularities at a warrant, like the fact that the authorities are in the incorrect address, or the scope of the warrant has been exceeded (by way of instance, by rifling through dresser drawers at a hunt for a stolen car). Search warrants frequently include restrictions on what could be searched, however, if the searching officers have absolute and unsupervised discretion above a hunt, a homeowner can't defend their rights.

Ultimately, this new"sneak and peek" electricity could be implemented as part of regular criminal investigations; it doesn't have anything to do with combating terrorism or collecting foreign intelligence.

Expansion of this intellect exception in wiretap legislation.

The rationale was that because the research wasn't conducted to collect evidence to put a person on trial, the criteria could be loosened. In a stark presentation of why it may be dangerous to make exceptions to basic rights, however, the Patriot Act expanded this once-narrow exclusion to ensure wiretaps and searches that DO gather evidence for routine national criminal cases. FISA previously allowed hunts only if the principal purpose was to collect foreign intelligence. However, the Patriot Act changes the law to permit hunts when"a substantial purpose" is intellect. That lets the authorities bypass the Constitution's probable cause requirement even if its principal aim is law enforcement.

The eagerness of many in law authorities to dispense with the necessities of the Fourth Amendment has been shown in August 2002 from the secret court that oversees national intelligence spying (the"FISA Court"). Making public among its remarks for the very first time, the court disclosed that it had rejected an effort by the Bush Administration to permit criminal prosecutors to use intellect warrants to evade the Fourth Amendment altogether. The court noted that representatives using for warrants had filed false and misleading info. That opinion is currently on appeal. [link to FISA webpage ]

Expansion of the"pen register" exclusion in wiretap legislation

Another exception to the normal requirement for probable cause of wiretap legislation can be expanded by the Patriot Act. Years ago, once the law governing telephone wiretaps was composed, a differentiation was made between two kinds of surveillance. The first enables surveillance of their content or significance of communication, and the next only permits monitoring of their transactional or fixing information attached to some communication. It's similar to the difference between studying the address printed on the exterior of a letter, and studying the letter indoors, or listening to your telephone conversation, and only documenting the telephone numbers dialed and received.

Wiretaps limited to transactional or fixing information are called"pen register/trap and trace" searches (such as the devices which were used on phones to collect phone numbers). The requirements for obtaining a PR/TT merit are non-existent: that the FBI need not show probable cause or even reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. It must only certify to a judge - without needing to prove it that such a warrant could be"relevant" to an ongoing criminal investigation. And the judge can't reject the program.

Under the Patriot Act, PR/TT orders issued by a judge are no more valid only in that judge's authority but may be made valid anywhere in America. This"nationwide service" further marginalizes the role of the judiciary, as a judge can't meaningfully monitor the degree to which her or his arrangement is used.

Pen register searches employed to the Online

The dilemma is it requires the weak criteria for access to transactional data and employs them to communicate which are much greater than addresses. On an email message, as an example, law enforcement has translated that the"header" of a message to be verifiable information reachable with a PR/TT warrant. However, in addition to routing info, email headers comprise the subject line, which is an element of the material of communication - to a letter, by way of instance, it would be within the envelope.

The government also asserts that the transactional info for Internet surfing is a listing of those URLs or Web site address a person's visits. 

Internet addresses are wealthy and showing content. Even the URLs or"addresses" of the internet pages we read aren't addressed, they're the names of files that we download on the internet. When we"see" an Internet page what we're doing is downloading this page on the internet on our computer, where it's displayed. As a result, the listing of URLs we see during an internet session is a list of those files we've downloaded no different from a listing of electronics we may have bought online. That is a lot more comprehensive information than a simple collection of those people we've communicated with; it's romantic information that shows who we are and what we're considering - how much more such as the content of a telephone call compared to the number. In the end, it's often said that studying is a"dialog" with the writer.

Internet addresses include communications delivered by a surfer. URLs themselves frequently have articles embedded inside them. 

In the same way, when I fill out an internet form - to buy merchandise or enroll my tastes, such as - these products and tastes will frequently be recognized in the resulting URL.

The erosion of responsibility

Efforts to discover how the new surveillance powers made by the Patriot Act were executed throughout their initial year were in vain. The Bush/Ashcroft Justice Department refused to explain how it was implementing the legislation; it left many significant questions and categorized others without rationale.                                                                      

That opens the doorway to the very same abuses that happened in the 1970s and earlier when the CIA participated in widespread spying on protest groups and other Americans. How long is it until an ambitious or politically motivated prosecutor employs the statute to control members of controversial activist groups such as Operation Rescue or Greenpeace using offenses? Under the Patriot Act, providing accommodation or support to these"terrorists" exposes an individual to prosecution or surveillance.

Enables for its indefinite detention of all non-citizens. Worse, even if the foreigner doesn't have a state that will take them, they may be detained indefinitely without trial.