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DOJ To Claim National Security in NSA Case

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the nice-idea-now-its-mine dept.

deblau writes "Wired is reporting that the federal government intends to invoke the rarely used 'State Secrets Privilege' in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's class action lawsuit against AT&T. The case alleges that the telecom collaborated with the NSA's secret spying on American citizens. The State Secrets Privilege lets the executive branch step into a civil lawsuit and have it dismissed if the case might reveal information that puts national security at risk."

4 of 337 comments (clear)

  1. I still don't see how state secrets applies by Raul654 · · Score: 5, Informative

    The 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (which established the FISA court) clearly and explicitely says that the US Government may not do survielance of American citizens without a warrant. I do not see how the government can assert privilege over the NSA's clearly illegal actions. (Nixon tried and failed - badly)

    --


    To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
    --E.C. Stanton
  2. Re:But if ... by Bacon+Bits · · Score: 4, Informative
    Hmm... cat constitution.txt | grep -i "privacy" It would appear that particular aspect of the document is missing.
    Didn't take a college government class, eh? Just because the word ain't there don't me the law ain't real.

    The US legal system is based on Rule of Law with precedence. That means previous court rulings on laws are considered the correct interpretation of laws, or, in this case, can effectively establish laws. Even constitutional ones.

    From http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html#privac y :

    The right to privacy The Constitution does not specifically mention a right to privacy. However, Supreme Court decisions over the years have established that the right to privacy is a basic human right, and as such is protected by virtue of the 9th Amendment. The right to privacy has come to the public's attention via several controversial Supreme Court rulings, including several dealing with contraception (the Griswold and Eisenstadt cases), interracial marriage (the Loving case), and abortion (the well-known Roe v Wade case). In addition, it is said that a right to privacy is inherent in many of the amendments in the Bill of Rights, such as the 3rd, the 4th's search and seizure limits, and the 5th's self-incrimination limit.

    More:
    http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/index.php/Privacy

    --
    The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
  3. Re:I think... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Well said. That is the point people are missing here. Nobody, especially the president, is above the law. If the law is there, they have to follow it, or ask congress to change the law (which they probably would have done).

    They broke the law. There is no getting around that. You cannot spy on us citizens without a warrant. There is a system set up to get that warrant secretly, and "speedily". They chose to not get a warrant (or 10,000 warrants). It is that simple.

    Using "national security" as a reason is not good enough. I think the supreme court already said this Even if we had all of our communications monitored, that would not stop a terrorist who is determined to kill himself and take people with him. Giving up privacy will not help us stop the terrorists. Even if we imposed "martial law", as long as they have the determination, they would keep trying to kill themselves.

    Look at Iraq now, we have how many hundreds of thousands of troops there, who have the authority to impose curfews, search without warrants, etc, and STILL there are many, many suicide bombings every month.

    And, furthermore, since this is a war without a clear end, when will we know they are not monitoring our communications? Will they come out and say it, or will we just have to "take their word for it"? Sorry, that's not good enough. They have no credibility.

  4. Absence of evidence by Beryllium+Sphere(tm) · · Score: 5, Informative

    >all this case is about is absence of evidence as THERE IS NO EVIDENCE for what you're implying.

    We have Mark Klein's written statement about tapping fiber at ATT facilities.

    > THERE IS NO EVIDENCE

    We have Russell Tice's testimony before the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations

    > THERE IS NO EVIDENCE

    Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez has defended the program

    > THERE IS NO EVIDENCE

    President Bush says he signed the order.

    > THERE IS NO EVIDENCE

    Could you try using boldface? Somehow the all-caps hasn't been enough to convince me.