What I learned about the Patriot Act

By Matt Morrison

This past November I went on a trip to the Princeton Model Congress debate in Washington, D.C. to argue over different pieces of model legislation with other high school students. The bill I submitted in the Senate Judiciary committee, which I was on, dealt with the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (better known as the Patriot Act). Although I originally wanted to abolish the whole thing in my bill, fellow members of the Governor’s School delegation who were more experienced advised me to try to repeal only certain sections. I consented to this recommendation, and during the committee debate on this bill I discovered that many Senators would have voted against the bill had I tried to repeal the whole Act. Fortunately, despite early opposition to my bill, I managed to convince everyone of the bill’s merits, and it passed 16-0. Through the experience of the conference, I learned much about the Patriot Act, its provisions, and how little some people seem to actually know about it.

It was amusing to me to see how many of the delegates, who were very intelligent and well informed, at first assumed that the Patriot Act is necessary to our national security due to the measures it provides, because they believed surveillance authority prior to the Act must have been weak. As I and other Senators pointed out, FISA and its future amendments already granted a great deal of surveillance power to the FBI before September 11th, 2001. The tragedies of that day occurred in large part due to law enforcement negligence and poor investigation, not because the FBI lacked sufficient powers or was bogged down by court restrictions.

Some also defended the Patriot Act by saying that its information sharing provisions are vital to “national security,” but such information sharing has happened in the past as well. Martin Luther King Jr. was once the target of FBI and CIA investigations and information sharing -- it was thought that his civil rights protests were a threat to “national security.” It is interesting to note that the Bush administration has deemed the Act as being so important to “national security” that in mid-December the president proclaimed that there could be no temporary extension on the Act’s sunset previsions to work out its revision; it was an “all or nothing” scenario. But to say that the Patriot Act should immediately be totally renewed or not renewed at all is to say that it’s not important enough to compromise on, that it can fall by the wayside if necessary, and this demonstrates that it is not vital to “national security.” Of course, the administration finally relented to allow a one month extension on the Act’s sunset provisions.

I’m sure that some of my fellow delegates initially had the notion that the worst provisions of the Patriot Act would expire anyway on December 31st, 2005, so why bother repealing parts of it now? As I pointed out, however, there are many egregious (yet little known) sections in the Act that do not sunset or expire. These include, but are not limited to, sections 216 and 805, as well as much of title III (the Financial Anti-Terrorism Act). The first of these, section 216, establishes the “PEN/Trap Authority,” which allows law enforcement to track all the websites a person visits as well as the emails/messages a person sends or receives. This can be done without a direct warrant; instead, law enforcement only has to certify that unnamed persons investigated under this authority were implied in the warrant or relate to an ongoing investigation. Judicial review is not a factor under this section since a judge cannot prevent this kind of investigation based on the merits. This is obviously a blatant violation of the fourth amendment which states that “no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

Section 805 has been vehemently opposed by the ACLU and other critics, and for good reason. Under this section, material support for terrorism now includes “expert advice and assistance.” Two assistant U.S. Attorneys, Christopher Morvillo and Robin Baker, have claimed that lawyers who defend terror suspects may now be prosecuted for doing so under this provision. I don’t think anyone could really have a fair trial if this section were carried out to the fullest, as this would intimidate any legal counsel.

The Financial Anti-Terrorism Act (FATA) was passed by the House of Representatives on October 17th, 2001 by a vote of 412-1 (the only “nay” vote was Ron Paul). It was later incorporated as title III of the Patriot Act, and none of it is set to expire. Title II of FATA itself deals with “Public-Private Cooperation” and requires all financial institutions to have adequate anti-money laundering programs, among other things. While written in the spirit of preventing money from falling into terrorists’ hands, in reality this legislation hurts average Americans and makes it harder for banks to do business. For instance, my brother, who is involved in the convenience store business, once tried to give money to a friend in Maryland to buy a load of gas. Due to FATA regulations, however; this friend of his could not take money from my brother’s account unless he drove all the way down to Richmond to the actual bank where the account was created to sign a form. Obtaining the money from a branch of the same bank elsewhere was impossible.

It seems ironic that I have mentioned the concerns and opinions of my fellow model Senators, when in fact they could represent those of the general public, or even the real Congress itself. From my trip to D.C., I noticed that most people I talked to think the Patriot Act is just fine because the worst provisions will all expire, but as I have pointed out, that is not the case. Democrats have rarely voiced opposition to the Act in general. Recently Harry Reid has been very vocal about his support for most of its measures. It also became evident from my trip that most people lack significant knowledge of the Patriot Act and the Constitution. With regard to the general public, who can blame them, since it is a 342 page document? I doubt that many Congressmen have even perused the Act in depth. I am deeply concerned about America’s failure to grasp neither basic legal principles nor the Founding Fathers’ intent. All too often it seems as though our leaders cherry-pick statements in the Constitution to give themselves more power.

It is an environment of carelessness and lack of concern for constitutional law which has lead to the passage of this callous Patriot Act. I believe the road is clear for this to be a dangerous precedent for further infringements on our civil rights as guaranteed by the Constitution. As I said in my closing speech on the Act in Princeton Model Congress, “What are those who interpret the Constitution broadly to say now that we have this Patriot Act, and what are they to say once we have martial law in New York and Star Chambers in Washington?”

Matt Morrison is a senior at Richmond, Virginia's Maggie L. Walker Governor's School, where he is co-president of the Organization of Governor's School Libertarians.