Opinion: Infringing on civil liberties

In a Congress terrified of appearing soft on terrorism, Democrats and Republicans passed by overwhelming majorities a deeply flawed antiterrorism bill that significantly -- and in some cases dangerously -- expands the powers of federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies with few hedges against abuse.

The bill, which was signed into law by President Bush on Friday, will markedly expand law enforcement's authority to conduct secret searches, track e-mail and Internet communications and obtain medical, financial and education records without a court order. It includes a definition of terrorism so broad that it could cover some of the nation's social activist groups.

Members of Congress who normally can be counted on to protect civil liberties -- lawmakers such as Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. and Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga. -- put up little resistance in the face of the Bush administration's claim that to delay granting the government these new powers was to delay efforts to root out terrorism on our soil.

Those lawmakers troubled by parts of the legislation took some comfort in the bill's sunset provision -- some of the expanded surveillance powers will expire at the end of four years unless renewed by Congress. Leahy said the automatic expiration "will be crucial in making sure that these new law enforcement powers are not abused." On closer examination, however, some of the powers most open to abuse are not covered by the sunset provisions, which means they will be written permanently into our statute books unless repealed by Congress. For example, there will be no sunset for the provision granting the CIA the ability to access previously confidential grand jury testimony, or for the authority of police agencies to conduct so-called "sneak and peek" searches, where the subject of the search is not told.

Congress adopted the USA Patriot Act, a complex bill of more than 130 pages, with only one public hearing and little debate. Some improvements were made to the administration's initial proposal, including sharply limiting a provision to allow the attorney general to indefinitely detain immigrants without charge, and eliminating a provision to allow prosecutors to use evidence gathered illegally on Americans by overseas intelligence operations. Other changes could have struck a better balance between security and freedom.

Some parts of the bill make sense -- for example, allowing law enforcement to place a tap on any telephone a terrorist suspect uses, instead of on just a particular phone. But other provisions unnecessarily infringe on civil liberties. There was a way to have given the administration the expanded authority it needs without weakening judicial oversight and other safeguards against abuse.

Congress gave the store away. And it did so with reckless disregard of the normal legislative process. The sun can't set soon enough on some parts of this legislation.

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