[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 26398-26399]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         THE EROSION OF PRIVACY

  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that I claim my 5 
minutes at this time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Paul) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, the privacy issue has been around for a long 
time. The brutal abuse of privacy and property of early Americans 
played a big role in our revolt against the king.

                              {time}  1800

  The first, fourth, and fifth amendments represented attempts to 
protect private property and privacy from an overzealous Federal 
Government. Today those attempts appear to have failed.
  There have been serious legal debates in recent decades about whether 
privacy is protected by the Constitution. Some argue that since the 
word does not appear in the text of that document, it is not protected. 
Others argue that privacy protection grants the Federal Government 
power to dictate to

[[Page 26399]]

all States limits or leniency in enforcing certain laws. But the 
essence of liberty is privacy.
  In recent years, especially since 9/11, Congress has been totally 
negligent in its duty to protect U.S. citizens from Federal Government 
encroachment on the rights of privacy. Even prior to 9/11, the Echelon 
worldwide surveillance system was well entrenched, monitoring all 
telephones, faxes, and e-mails.
  From the 1970s forward, national security letters were used sparingly 
in circumventing the legal process and search warrant requirements. 
Since 9/11 and the subsequent passage of the PATRIOT Act, however, the 
use of these instruments has skyrocketed from 300 annually to over 
30,000. There is essentially no oversight nor understanding by the U.S. 
Congress of the significance of this pervasive government surveillance. 
It is all shrugged off as necessary to make us safe from terrorism. 
Sacrificing personal liberty and privacy, the majority feels, is no big 
deal.
  We soon will vote on the conference report reauthorizing the PATRIOT 
Act. Though one would argue there has been a large grass-roots effort 
to discredit the PATRIOT Act, Congress has ignored this message. 
Amazingly, over 391 communities and seven States have passed 
resolutions highly critical of the PATRIOT Act.
  The debate in Congress, if that is what one wants to call it, boils 
down to whether the most egregious parts of the act will be sunsetted 
after 4 years or 7 years. The conference report will adjust the 
numbers, and Members will vote willingly for the ``compromise'' and 
feel good about their effort to protect individual privacy.
  But if we are honest with ourselves, we would admit that the fourth 
amendment is essentially a dead letter. There has been no effort to 
curb the abuse of national security letters nor to comprehend the 
significance of Echelon. Hard-fought liberties are rapidly slipping 
away from us.
  Congress is not much better when it comes to protecting against the 
erosion of the centuries-old habeas corpus doctrine. By declaring 
anyone an enemy combatant, a totally arbitrary designation by the 
President, the government can deny an individual his right to petition 
a judge or even speak with an attorney. Though there has been a good 
debate on the insanity of our policy of torturing prisoners, holding 
foreigners and Americans without charges seems acceptable to many. Did 
it never occur to those who condemn torture that unlimited detention of 
individuals without a writ of habeas corpus is itself torture, 
especially for those who are totally innocent? Add this to the 
controversial worldwide network of secret CIA prisons now known of for 
2 years and we should be asking ourselves what have we become as a 
people. Recent evidence that we are using white phosphorus chemical 
weapons in Iraq does nothing to improve our image.
  Our prestige in the world is slipping. The war is going badly. Our 
financial system is grossly overburdened, and we spend hundreds of 
hours behind the scenes crafting a mere $5 billion spending cut while 
pretending no one knows we can spend tens of billions in off-budget 
supplemental bills, sometimes even under unanimous consent.
  It is time we consider the real purpose of government in a society 
that professes to be free: protection of liberty, peaceful commerce, 
and keeping itself out of our lives, our economy, our pocketbooks, and 
certainly out of the affairs of foreign nations.

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