Dissent Is Patriotic

The Bill of Rights Defense Committee's e-mail newsletter

August 20, 2003, Vol. 2, No. 5

Newsletter topics:

• The Movement, Impact on Legislation, Ashcroft's Tour to Defend Patriot Act
• Register for October 18-19, 2003, conference: Grassroots America Defends the Bill of Rights
• Tips for passing resolutions: Why liberties are a local issue; resolution movement's educational value
• Lawsuits challenge Patriot Act following Justice Department Inspector General's Report
• VICTORY Act unveiled
• In brief:

  • Albany Common Council receives Freedom Award
  • BORDC's website tracks movement among religious, academic, labor, and other organizations
  • Share tools, ideas for October 26
  • Staff notes: Vanessa Bliss joins BORDC as organizer
  • We've moved!

The Movement, Impact on Legislation, Ashcroft's Tour

150 Municipalities. On August 18, 2003, the Astoria, Oregon City Council became the 150th municipality to pass a civil liberties resolution, and work is now underway in more than 100 other communities. The population of the communities and three states that have passed resolutions now exceeds 17 million. Religious organizations, student and faculty groups, unions, and organizations are also weighing in on the issue of lost liberties with resolutions of their own.

Legislation. Members of Congress are also turning their misgivings about the hastily passed Patriot Act into legislation to roll back some of its more egregious provisions. In a surprise move, on July 23, Congressmen Butch Otter (R-ID), Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), and Ron Paul (R-TX) introduced an amendment to a House appropriations bill that cuts off funding for "sneak-and-peek" searches authorized by Section 213 of the Patriot Act. The amendment passed by a vote of 309-118. If the Senate follows suit, funding for searches in which notice of the execution of a warrant is delayed could disappear. See BORDC's Legislation page for other bills and amendments passed or in progress, including Congressman Bernie Sanders's "Freedom to Read Protection Act" (H.R. 1157), which now has 131 cosponsors.

Attorney General Ashcroft on Tour to Defend USA PATRIOT Act. Various news media have announced that Attorney General Ashcroft will begin a tour of about 18 cities to defend the Justice Department's successful use of the Patriot Act. According to a Newsweek article, the reason for the tour is that "Ashcroft and his top aides are worried that a grassroots campaign to roll back the Patriot Act is gaining momentum." At press time the list included an August 19 kick-off event at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., followed by appearances in Philadelphia, Cleveland, Detroit, Des Moines, Milwaukee, Salt Lake City, New York, and Boston. For updated information, visit our Ashcroft tour page. Congratulations to all of you who have contributed to the momentum. If you want to preserve our liberties but have stayed on the sidelines until now, please help us keep the momentum going by educating people in your community about the dangers of inaction when essential liberties are at stake.

Register for Grassroots America Defends the Bill of Rights, the first national conference

It's time to register for the October 18 through 19 conference has just begun. If you are part of a group that has passed or is working on a resolution, please join us at the Hilton in Silver Spring, MD (accessible via the Washington, DC, Metro) for a weekend conference, followed by an optional Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill.The primary goal of the weekend conference is to advance the movement's impact on national policy. For information about the conference and how to register, visit the conference website: grassroots-america.org.

Tips for passing resolutions: Why liberties are a local issue; resolution movement's educational value

Your resolution campaign is a vehicle for furthering community education and encouraging greater civic responsibility and participation. One of the most valuable benefits of organizing locally to get a resolution passed is educating the people in your community about their fundamental rights. If you do the necessary organizing, you are likely to ensure passage of your resolution and you will definitely provide an important community service.

One of the biggest mistakes local groups can make is introducing their resolution too soon without doing the necessary organizing that will ensure passage of the resolution. Effective organizing consists of educating the public, building and demonstrating grassroots support for the resolution, and collaborating with your city council and police department to ensure its passage. Cultivating a broad-base of support and including elected officials in the process, can help your group avoid possible stumbling blocks, such as the council's not including your resolution on their agenda, indefinite postponement of the vote on the resolution, and possibly even failure to win a majority.

It is extremely important to invite council members and members of the police department to participate in the drafting of your resolution, to include the council and police department in your education events, and to solicit the support and suggestions from a broad range of people that is representative of your community. Try to talk with all of the members of your city, town, or county council, and don't rely on the "usual suspects" in your council to introduce and sponsor the resolution. Because this is not a liberal or conservative issue, people with many different politcal viewpoints will want to support the resolution if they understand its necessity. This issue makes for strange bedfellows--but this is our strength. If your group builds a diverse and representative coalition supporting the Patriot Act resolution, and if you collaborate with your elected officials, most likely your resolution campaign will be a success.

Please see BORDC's Tools page for a step-by-step explanation of how to organize a successful resolution campaign.

Lawsuits challenging Patriot Act and the Inspector General's Report

In June, the Department of Justice Inspector General released a report detailing the detentions of Arab and Muslim men since 9-11. The report showed that hundreds of men that had no connection to the September 11 attacks were detained for several months with no charges and no access to a lawyer. Since the report's real ease, the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights have filed lawsuits claiming the unconstitutionality of certain provisions of the Patriot Act.

The ACLU's lawsuit challenges a section of the act that expands the ability of the FBI to secretly search personal records of U.S. citizens and residents. The ACLU claims the provision violates the Fourth Amendment by allowing secret searches and seizures without proving probable cause; violates the First Amendment by allowing the FBI to look into what individuals are reading, and who they're communicating with over the internet; and also violates the First Amendment by prohibiting librarians, booksellers or anyone else asked to cooperate in a search from telling anyone about it. The groups say the act is disproportionately aimed at residents of certain ethnic, religious and minority communities. Muslim groups from Oregon, Michigan, Washington, and Tennessee have joined the suit. For more information, see this article.

The Center for Constitutional Rights' lawsuit challenges a stipulation in the Patriot Act that criminalizes "expert advice and assistance" to proscribed organizations. Plaintiff Dr. Jeyalangim is a Tamil-American physician who is deeply concerned for the welfare of the Tamils in Sri Lanka as members of his family were forced to flee that country as refugees. He would like to alleviate the shortage of trained physicians in the Tamil Eelam region of northeast Sri Lanka by providing his medical services. However, because some of the hospitals in the region are run by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Dr. Jeyalangim is afraid to do so because he fears prosecution for providing material support. For more information see the Center for Constitutional Rights' website.