U.S. Senate votes to indefinitely suspend habeas corpus

On Tuesday, November, 29th, 2011, the United States Senate voted in favor of keeping an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act which gives the U.S. military the authority to detain American citizens on American soil, indefinitely, without due process in the name of fighting terrorism.

Both of our Senators from the state of Pennsylvania, Casey(D) and Toomey(R), voted in favor of this provision, that violates the clause in the 5th amendment of our Constitution, which guarantees all citizens the right to due process under the law.

To place this in context, let's take a quick look at was has occurred over the last 11 years.

After 9/11, Americans were in a collective state of fear and apprehension about the future threat of terrorist attacks on American soil. In that uncertainty, the government offered us a solution which they told us they needed to help fight these terrorists.

The problem was that this "solution" contained provisions which directly violated enumerated rights in our Constitution, including rights related to due process and search and seizure.

However, despite vehement warnings from civil libertarians about potential abuse, the Patriot Act was passed into law.

Six years later, in 2007, an audit by the Justice Department revealed serious misuse of the Patriot Act by the F.B.I. to gather private information on American citizens without proper court orders.

Fast forward to a hearing before the Senate Judiciary committee in 2009, in which Senator Feingold, from Wisconsin, quoted statistics from the Federal government in 2008 showing that “sneak and peak” warrants, a provision of the Patriot Act which circumvents due process, were used 763 times. In only 3 instances were they used in cases related to terror investigations, the rest were non-terror related cases, and 65% of them were for drug related cases.

The following year, in 2010, here in Pennsylvania, memos were leaked from the PA Department of Homeland Security which revealed that an independent, foreign intelligence firm had been hired to spy on Pennsylvanians.

In these memos, next to threat assessments from Middle Eastern terror groups were assessments and updates related to peaceful political groups, including environmental, gay rights, anti-drilling, anti-war, and pro second amendment, activist groups, among others.

In the name of fighting the “war on terror”, we gave up some of our most basic liberties, only to find that normal Americans participating in their right to protest, under the 1st amendment, were being monitored as potential terrorist threats. Further, we see that the overwhelming majority of instances in which the Patriot Act was used were for normal investigations, not terrorism, and that our government was also using the Patriot Act to gather information on private citizens, illegally, through the F.B.I..

Looking at how they have misused the Patriot Act, do you really think the government won't abuse the privilege they are now asking us to give them? Do you really want the government to have the legal authority to abduct American citizens in secret and hold them indefinitely on the mere suspicion of terrorism?

Benjamin Franklin's warning about trading liberty for security has never rung more true than now. The Bill of Rights in our Constitution was designed to protect us; not from some foreign enemy, or threat of terrorism, but from what the Founders viewed as the greatest threat to individual liberty and freedom: our own government.

How quickly we have forgotten the lessons of the past, willingly laying down the very freedoms which have preserved our liberty and kept us safe from the threat of tyranny within. If we give in and let these rights be taken, history teaches us where that road leads.

Call you elected representatives in Washington and tell them not to support this unconstitutional provision to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012, and let them know you support President Obama's promise to use his veto power if it crosses his desk with this amendment.