|
Debate on Patriot Act hits home
By Ken Goze Staff Writer
Pioneer Press - July 17, 2003
The USA Patriot Act, which gave law enforcement officials much broader powers to investigate and detain people, may have gotten a free pass through Congress in the days after Sept. 11, 2001, but the law is now facing scrutiny from a public that fears the law will prove a greater threat to civil liberties than to terrorists.
North Shore area residents joined the growing nationwide debate about the law, which has led many civic groups and local governments to press for its repeal and to slow consideration of even tougher measures drafted by the Bush administration.
A League of Women Voters forum Sunday featured U.S. Attorney for Northern Illinois Patrick Fitzgerald, American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois Communications Director Ed Yohnka and several experts on library issues, immigration law and banking. About 350 people attended.
The Illinois League of Women Voters recently passed a resolution urging the national group to seek abolition of the act, but the group continued with earlier plans for the forum to give people a chance to inform themselves, said Josie Hamilton, president of the Glenview league.
"We all need to learn about the ramifications of the USA Patriot Act," Hamilton said.
The Patriot Act has become best known in many quarters for the powers it grants FBI agents to browse through library records, but it affects many parts of federal law related to electronic surveillance, and the ability to detain and deport non-citizens. The wide-ranging changes to federal law are spread throughout volumes of code books in the form of small wording changes, said William Zieske, an attorney and former librarian.
"It is troubling that we've lived with this law for nearly two years and very few people, even lawyers, know what it says or what it does," Zieske said.
http://www.pioneerlocal.com/cgi-bin/ppo-story/localnews/current/gv/07-17-03-65781.html
|
