Patriot games: Protecting Civil Liberties.

• Author: Doherty, Brian
• Position: Citings - Civil liberties after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States - Brief Article

WE'VE ALL HEARD the alarming news for civil liberties contained in the massive USA PATRIOT Act rushed into law in November. (It's an acronym, believe it or not: Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.)

Among those tools are the ability to conduct physical searches without property owners being present or alerted ("sneak-and-peak"), increased power for government officials to designate organizations as "terrorists" and to deport non-citizens who belong to them, and enhanced law-enforcement abilities to conduct phone and Internet taps with lower levels of judicial oversight.

But it wasn't all bad news. In the heady, frightened rush immediately after September II, even worse ideas were floating around that thankfully didn't make it into law--or at least haven't yet.

Among them, says the Free Congress Foundation's J. Bradley Jansen, who helped organize a left-right coalition to defend civil...