March
21, 2003
Front-Page
News
Deep Six for
the Fourth? New legislation under consideration by the
Department of Justice would spell the death knell for the Fourth
Amendment to the Constitution, MHC politics professor Christopher
Pyle said in a story posted last week on ABCNEWS.com. Pyle and
other civil libertarians and constitutional scholars, already
deeply concerned over encroachments on privacy and civil liberties
resulting from the “war on terror,” are particularly
disturbed by new legislation, the so-called USA Patriot Act II,
now being weighed by the Bush administration. In fact, not only
are liberals like Pyle dismayed, but Patriot II is giving some
staunch conservatives the heebie-jeebies as well. According to
the ABC report titled “Conservative Backlash: Provisions
of ‘Patriot II’ Draft Worry Those on Right”:
“‘I don’t think the Fourth Amendment exists
anymore,’ said Pyle, a professor of politics at Mount Holyoke
College, referring to the amendment that prohibits unreasonable
search and seizure and requires probable cause for a search or
arrest. ‘I think it’s been buried by the Patriot Act
and some of the court rulings that have been handed down. We need
a requiem mass for the Fourth Amendment, because it’s gone.’”
Why the concern from both sides of the political spectrum? Said
Pyle, again quoted in the Web report by Dean Schabner: “According
to what is in the draft, if adopted it would allow the Justice
Department to wiretap a person for fifteen days without a warrant;
federal agents could secretly arrest people and provide no information
to their family, the media or their attorney until charges are
brought, no matter how long that took; and it would allow the
government to strip Americans of their citizenship for even unknowingly
helping a group that is connected to an organization deemed to
be terrorist.”
History Lessons The Bush Administration has failed to
prepare Americans for the sacrifices that might be required for
a war in Iraq, a failure that could undermine support for the
war if soldiers and civilians begin dying in large numbers, Jon
Western, professor of international relations, writes in a March
9 commentary in the Sunday Republican of Springfield. In “Bush
Shouldn’t Make Attack on Iraq Sound Easy,” Western
draws parallels between Iraq and failed military efforts in the
Philippines, Korea, and Vietnam, when “Americans turned
against the wars amid rising casualty rates and because of lingering
questions as to whether war was absolutely necessary.” Despite
the “excessive optimism” shown by the president and
his supporters, Western writes, there are good reasons to think
that things may not go so as planned in Iraq. “History warns
us that Americans are ill served when our leaders ignore the reality
of war and delude themselves and the public into believing it
can be done on the cheap,” he warns.
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