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"There is no doubt
that if we lived in a police state, it would be easier to catch
terrorists. If we lived in a country where the police were allowed
to search your home at any time for any reason; if we lived in
a country where the government is entitled to open your mail,
eavesdrop on your phone conversations, or intercept your e-mail
communications; if we lived in a country where people could be
held indefinitely based . . . on mere suspicion that they are
up to no good, the government would probably discover and arrest
more terrorists, or would-be terrorists.... But that wouldn't
be a country in which we would want to live."
Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold
on the USA Patriot Act, Oct 11, 2002
(he was the only House or Senate member to vote agianst the USA
Patriot Act)
Reports
Articles
"There have been
periods in our nation's history when civil liberties have taken
a backseat to what appeared at the same time to be the legitimate
exigencies of war. Our national consciousness still bears the
stain and the scars of those events: The Alien and Sedition Acts,
the suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War, the internment
of Japanese-Americans, German-Americans, and Italian-Americans
during World War II, the blacklisting of supposed communist sympathizers
during the McCarthy era, and the surveillance and harassment of
antiwar protestors, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., during
the Vietnam War. We must not allow these pieces of our past to
become prologue."
Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold
in the book Dude, where's my country by Michael Moore
Democracy
and Society
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