by Richard Prior
Staff Writer
The answers seem obvious.
Can you have too much freedom?
Not as long as you understand that your freedom to swing your fist stops at the other guy’s nose.
Can you have too much security?
Of course not . . . unless you consider the type of security provided by totalitarian regimes.
A panel of five speakers probably didn’t change many opinions last week as they debated the effects of the USA Patriot Act on freedom and security.
But they got the issues out in the open, which is where they wanted them in the first place.
“We’re not here to tell you everything in the Patriot Act is troubling or bad,” said Kenneth Hurley with the American Civil Liberties Union. “There are many sections that are benign and fairly innocuous.”
However, he added, “There are some sections that, we feel, traverse the line of what our Constitutional framework is all about.”
Other speakers on the panel at Florida Coastal School of Law were Larry Meyer, supervisory special agent with the FBI; Professors Stephen Durden and Michael Jorgensen of FCSL; and Maryellen O’Brien, with the FCSL Library Center.
The discussion was organized by the school’s Democrats and Republican Club.
The Patriot Act was slapped together in a climate that almost guaranteed its passage, said Hurley. Approval was a dead solid certainty when the act acquired its title: the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism of 2001.
Only one senator and 66 representatives voted against the act.
“The one senator, Russ Feingold, said 90 percent of the Patriot Act is OK,” said Hurley. “It’s that other 10 percent that is extremely troubling.”
Meyer said the act was intended to give terror investigators the same tools that are available to those trying to shut down drug cartels and organized crime.
“The Patriot Act was not enacted to limit or restrict civil liberties we as citizens and lawful residents of the United States enjoy,” said Meyer. “It was enacted to correct existing deficiencies in existing statutes which greatly hindered, if not prevented, the FBI and CIA to adequately protect the United States from terrorist attack.”
Durden, who teaches Constitutional law, said the public shouldn’t take the government’s word for it that its actions are always beneficial.
“It may be true that all these powers have been exercised in the past,” he said. “The question is, do we increase the powers for terrorism, or do we realize that maybe some of those powers . . . should not have been exercised in the first place?
“It’s a choice that the government may make. It’s a choice that you have to make in choosing who your leaders are.”
Jorgensen said he supported the need for the greater security that the Patriot Act helps provide.
Repeating a quote engraved in the side of the Jefferson Memorial, Jorgensen said, “Laws and institutions must go hand-in-hand with the change of circumstances. Institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times.”
“If we want to preserve our nation and our way of life,” Jorgensen said, “there is nothing more important than preventing another catastrophic terror attack like we had 9/11. We as a nation have to realize the nature of terrorism has changed and that the laws we had before 9/11 did not protect us from those changes.”
O’Brien said that fears about the act’s Section 215 — which gives investigators access to all manner of records, including library activity — have been “blown out of proportion.”
“The library groups are up in arms,” she said. “Libraries have started to purge their records. But the act doesn’t override the state and local privacy laws. And no warrants have been issued.”
Meyer agreed that Section 215 “is probably the most misunderstood section”:
“This is the one most often cited by critics, saying the FBI can go into your local public library and demand the records so the reading habits of library patrons can be examined.
“But the agent must disclose the relevance the requested records have to an ongoing investigation in the affidavit to the court.”
Durden said he believes the act tips the scales too much on the side of safety at the expense of freedom. But, he conceded, he could be wrong. And his audience should make the effort to decide for themselves.
“I didn’t say I don’t want to be safe,” he said. “I didn’t say we shouldn’t be safe. But if you simply defer to safety, you give up your rights.
“At least challenge. Challenge what they’re doing.”