Home > Window on Washington > Archives > 2007 > August > 08 > Entry
ACLU demands secret court cough up evidence
While Congress vacations, the American Civil Liberties Union is working at a warp speed to find out everything possible about the scope of the president’s terrorist surveillance program.
The ACLU files legal papers today with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court requesting that the secret court disclose recent legal opinions discussing the scope of the government’s authority to engage in secret wiretapping of Americans.
The civil liberties group wants to gather as much information as it can to persuade Congress to pass new legislation that would restrict wiretapping without a warrant. In a last-minute blitz, Congress gave the Bush administration expanded authority to tap international phone calls and e-mails.
“Over the next six months, the public and Congress will be debating one of the most important matters of our time: under what circumstances the government should be permitted to use its profoundly intrusive surveillance powers to intercept the communications of people inside the United States,” said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU.
The FISA court must disclose the documents that prompted the legislation last week that gave the administration more power to eavesdrop so that the public can be privy to an informed debate about why this is necessary, Romero said.
“Unless the FISA court discloses the documents leading up to the recent law and shedding light on the government’s claimed surveillance authority, an informed and meaningful debate — the cornerstone of our democracy — cannot occur,” Romero said. “A conversation about a threat to our most precious constitutional rights and liberties should not occur in a factual vacuum.”
The court’s orders have played a critical role in the evolution of the government’s surveillance activities over the past six years, according to the ACLU.
Bush authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on phone calls and e-mails of suspected terrorists and people living in America shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The New York Times revealed the program’s existence in December 2005, prompting an outcry from civil liberties groups about surveillance without a warrant from the secret court.
In January 2007, just days before an appeals court was to hear the government’s appeal from a judicial ruling that ruled the program illegal, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales announced that the NSA program would be discontinued.
At the time, Gonzales said that the FISA court orders issued on Jan. 10, 2007 made it possible to bring the terrorist surveillance program under its jurisdiction.
Government officials have spoken publicly about the court’s orders in congressional testimony, to the media and in legal papers - but the orders have never been released.
They have also indicated that the FISC issued other orders in the spring that restricted the administration’s surveillance activities. House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the court had issued a ruling prohibiting intelligence agents from intercepting foreign-to-foreign calls passing through the United States.
A copy of the ACLU’s motion to the FISC is available online at:
Permalink | |
