“Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”
- Justice Louis Brandeis, Dissenting opinion, Olmstead v. the United States, 1928
America faces grave dangers today, as grave as any in our history. Islamic extremists have targeted Americans around the world and here in U.S., and clearly intend to use the worst weapons at their disposal in their war against us.
In this environment, our leaders are justifiably determined to protect American citizens. However, this is exactly the situation that Justice Brandeis and countless others have warned America about since our founding. Today, men and women of zeal are pushing through legislation that will seriously undermine our Constitution and set back the cause of liberty that men and women have fought and died for since 1775.
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) has passed the House and Senate and has been signed into law by President Obama. The NDAA writes into law the unconstitutional authority claimed by the president to indefinitely detain American citizens suspected of supporting terrorism and denies them the right to due process or trial. Worse, it allows the U.S. government to detain Americans as long as we are at war with terrorists, and this is a war with no end in sight. As Senator Rand Paul has said, “The rights we lose now may never be restored.”
As conservativs, we need to be defending the liberties that are guaranteed to Americans by the Constitution. I support Senator Mike Lee’s bill to protect American civil liberties, the “Due Process Guarantee Act of 2011,” which makes clear that a declaration of war or authorization for the use of military force by Congress does not authorize the indefinite detention of American citizens or legal residents who are apprehended in the United States.
And I call on George Allen to stand up for the Constitution, instead of standing strong for big brother government, and denounce these unconstitutional provisions of the NDAA and support Senator Lee’s Due Process Guarantee Act.
Mary Henrich says:
January 03, 2012 at 8:58 amWhen the government tells me not to worry, that my rights have been protected, I tend to believe just the opposite. Sen. Lee’s proposed legislation while good is just another demonstration that Congress spends too much time trying to get the horse back into the barn because Congress left the door open in the first place. Anyone can lead by hindsight; what we need are legislators who are willing to see the consequrences of their actions before taking those actions. I regret that you are forced to support legislation that goes in reverse rather than forward.
Denouncing the NDAA? « The Virginia Conservative says:
January 06, 2012 at 9:52 am[...] At this point, to the best of my knowledge, only one of the Senate candidates has come out in opposition to NDAA. That candidate is Jamie Radtke. As she wrote in a recent article, “Today, men and women of zeal are pushing through legislation that will seriously undermine our Constitution and set back the cause of liberty that men and women have fought and died for since 1775.” She goes on to add, “The NDAA writes into law the unconstitutional authority claimed by the president to indefinitely detain American citizens suspected of supporting terrorism and denies them the right to due process or trial. Worse, it allows the U.S. government to detain Americans as long as we are at war with terrorists, and this is a war with no end in sight.” You can read all of her thoughts on her website. [...]