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National Security Letters Ruled Unconstitutional, Banned
A U.S. District Court Judge in California today ruled that so-called National Security Letters, used by government agencies to force business and organizations to turn over information on citizens, are unconstitutional. Judge Susan Illston ordered the government to stop using them, but gave the government a 90-day window to appeal the decision, during which the NSLs may still be sent out. The letters were challenged by the Electronic Frontier Foundation on behalf of a telecom who was ordered to provide data. "The telecom took the extraordinary and rare step of challenging the underlying authority of the National Security Letter, as well as the legitimacy of the gag order that came with it. Both challenges are allowed under a federal law that governs NSLs, a power greatly expanded under the Patriot Act that allows the government to get detailed information on Americans’ finances and communications without oversight from a judge. The FBI has issued hundreds of thousands of NSLs and been reprimanded for abusing them — though almost none of the requests have been challenged by the recipients. After the telecom challenged the NSL, the Justice Department took its own extraordinary measure and sued the company, arguing in court documents that the company was violating the law by challenging its authority. The move stunned the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is representing the anonymous telecom. ... After heated negotiations with EFF, the Justice Department agreed to stay the civil suit and let the telecom’s challenge play out in court. The Justice Department subsequently filed a motion to compel in the challenge case, but has never dropped the civil suit."
It's nice to see checks and balances. I wondered what happened to those.
. Stunning is the right word. That lawsuit, which appears to still be active, is an affront to a nation of laws with respect for civil rights. Legally attacking citizens for challenging authority ought to carry a steep political price.
Yeah, this actually makes me want to donate outside of the bundles. It's great to see an organization that is fighting for the rights of individual citizens instead of companies and the government.
Which is silly, because if companies even wanted to expend the slightest effort to pretend that was the case, they would call it "Employee Services". They call it "Human Resources" quite honestly -- its there to manage corporate resources that happen to be human.
No, its there to protect the value of the employees (including those that are "management") as corporate assets; protecting the corporation from harm when those assets operate outside of the corporations desired parameters is a part of that, but doesn't define the role. This is much the same role as, say, the department tasked with overseeing factory operations has with respect to heavy machinery.
Manging morale for the purpose of increasing retention and productivity is part of the positive value side of protecting the value of the employees as corporate assets as much as mitigating the harm from dissatisfied employees is on the negative value side. You oil the machine to keep it working while it is working as desired, and you contain the damage and discard it as quickly as possible when it stops doing so and becomes a liability to keep around. All part of the same mission.
You know what's interesting is that the Bill of Rights is in the constitution as a pack of 10 amendments, whereas the laws that even define the concepts of state secrets and classified information are established at a federal statute level.
Given the supremacy clause, shouldn't my civil rights trump concerns about national security?
The law that says I am entitled to due process outranks the law that says I have to let the government play keep-away with information.
It's the interpretation that gets you. They simply redefine the words of the Constitution so that it means what they'd like it to say.
Some people still think there are two parties in Washington instead of two faces of the same party, the Money Party.