Civil Liberty Restrictions

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Table of Contents

Introduction
The USA PATRIOT Act
Threat to Civil Liberties
The First and the Fourth Amendment
Violation of Democracy
Water boarding
Conclusion
References

Introduction

The America civil liberties are the Bill of Rights and are the first ten amendments in the United States constitution. These are the inalienable basic rights of the citizens since independence and form the central pillar of the human rights.

The preamble of the United States constitution affirms the intention of the people that, “…to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” (Robinson, 2004).

The dream of the founding fathers of the United States constitution was to achieve and protect the liberty for future generations but the aftermath of the September11, 2001 have changed their dream of liberty. The protections of Americans against terrorism have resulted into violation and restriction of their liberties as stipulated in the constitution.

The USA PATRIOT Act

The Congress passed the bill immediately after the September 11, 2001 attacks. The Act stands for “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism” (USA PATRIOT) (Robinson, 2004). The purpose of Act is to protect Americans against brutal terrorist attacks because the Act introduced stringent counter terrorism measures, enhanced the functioning of the intelligence agencies and judicial enforcement of the law.

Although the USA PATRIOT Act seemed to have a logical intention of counter terrorism, the circumstances under which the bill was drafted and passed are questionable. The 342-page bill was drafted in a hurry and passed into an Act within 45 days following the September 11, 2001 attacks and many members of the Congress confessed that they voted for it without reading (Robinson, 2004).

Furthermore, according to Robinson (2004), the author of the bill confirmed that, “that version of the USA PPATRIOT Act Voted on by the Congress was not the bill that had been approved in the committee and that had been endorsed by the American Civil Liberties Union.” The USA PATRIOT Act has more than it meets our eyes, as it appears that the bill has other intentions beyond September 11 attacks: the restriction and violation of civil liberties.

Threat to Civil Liberties

Civil libertarians and legal experts have analyzed the extent to which the USA PATRIOT Act violates and restrict the liberties of the Americans and has stirred up various states, counties and some organizations to appeal against and advocate for the amendments to the provisions that violates or restrict civil liberties. The Act has violates and restricts some of the first ten amendments in the United States Constitution.

These amendments are: “the First Amendment (freedom of speech and assembly), Fourth Amendment (freedom from unreasonable search and seizure), Fifth Amendment (right to due process of law), Sixth Amendment (right to speedy, public, and fair trials, right to confront accusers, and right to a criminal defense), and Eighth Amendment (freedom from excessive and cruel & unusual punishment)” (Robinson, 2004).

The ten amendments of the bill of rights are the fundamental to the human rights and any violation or restriction of these amendments threatens the civil liberties of the citizen.

The First and the Fourth Amendment

The first amendment provides Americans with the “freedom of speech, religion and assembly while the fourth amendment protects them against unreasonable search and seizure” (Robinson, 2004). Both the first and the fourth amendment protect our right to the privacy but the adoption of the USA PATRIOT Act by the federal government have led to the violation and restriction of the fundamental rights of privacy.

According to Garlinger (2009), the USA PATRIOT Act have allowed the Federal Bureau of investigation, without any judicial review to “issue national security letters to telecommunications providers to obtain the customers subscriber information, including sources of payment, records of Internet activity, addressees and subject lines of emails, websites visited, and search queries.”

In the view of the USA PARTOT Act, obtaining private information from the third party is not a violation of the fourth amendment because the subscriber voluntarily gave the information to the third party.

Earlier before the introduction of the USA PATRIOT Act, the citizens enjoyed the full rights of privacy and if necessary, prior judicial review was required, but currently, the rights to privacy have been limited to the extent that the source of information from a third party is no longer considered private.

The first amendment provides the freedom and right to privacy of speech and association. The limitation of the fourth amendment weakens the first amendment in that loss of privacy due to rights of the third party to disclose private information is a restriction to the freedom of speech and association.

The USA PATRIOT Act has violated and restricted the rights to privacy because the fourth amendment that protects our private actions and information has been changed to allow the scrutiny and tracking of personal information for the interest of intelligence agency (Puddington & Melia, 2005).

The third party information disclosure is a true reflection of our nature of speech and the association membership. Therefore, one can easily and innocently labeled as a terrorist because of association with a certain sect, religion, political or even talking about terrorism. Hence, one can be accused as a terrorist by the nature of speech and association, which is a basic human right.

Violation of Democracy

The first and the fourth amendment of the United States constitution have been subtlety violated and obviously restricted. The violation and restriction of the civil liberties violates the importance principles of the democracy: the freedom of speech and association.

Restriction of liberties makes it very hard for one to explore the depths of democracy in the politics when the private information about political strategies and association is under the intelligence agency and private communication is being scavenged from the electronic sources. The citizens need no protection against terrorism at the expense of losing their fundamental rights of freedom.

Water boarding

Water-boarding torture violates the fifth amendment of the United States constitution States that, “…no person shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself” (Hahn, 2008). They use of torturing as interrogative tool does not only violates the constitution but the inherent human right. Thus, whether inflicted on a free person or a prisoner, torture violates the amendments of rights.

Conclusion

The historical attack on America, the September 11, 2001, resulted into constitutional amendment in order to fight terrorism. The passing of the USA PATRIOT herald the violation and restriction of civil liberties in that the Fourth amendment allowed the access of the information from a third party hence providing the security intelligence a loophole to restrict of freedom of speech and association basing on the third party information.

This makes the society very transparent with no longer any privacy. Therefore, both the first and the fourth amendment are necessary for the full protection the rights to privacy.

References

Garlinger, P. (2009). Privacy, Free Speech, and the Patriot Act: First and Fourth Amendment Limits on National Security Letters. New York University Law Review. Web.

Huhn, W. (2008). Water boarding is Illegal. Washington University Law Review. Web.

Puddington, A. & Melia, T. (2005). Today’s America: How Free? Freedom House. Web.

Robinson, M. (2004). Civil Liberties and the War on Terror: An Eight Part Series. Appalachian State University. Web.

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