Civil Liberties & Privacy

Bush’s Bogus Theory of Absolute Power

by James Bovard April 7, 2006

The Bush administration has a theory to explain why the Founding Fathers secretly intended for the president to have boundless power. Even though the new unitary executive theory is nowhere in the Constitution, White House officials continually invoke it to justify scorning federal law. The fact that the administration is getting away with this charade symbolizes how docile much ...

Bush’s Wiretap Crimes and the FISA Farce

by James Bovard March 1, 2006

President Bush proudly announced last December that he is violating federal law. He declared that in 2002 he had ordered the National Security Agency to begin conducting warrantless wiretaps and email intercepts on Americans. He asserted that the wiretaps would continue, regardless of the law. Bush claims that he must ignore ...

Illegal Surveillance: A Real Security Threat

by James Bovard February 27, 2006

Americans seem to have forgotten why the Founding Fathers prohibited government from spying on them. Public opinion polls show that a rising percentage of Americans approve of the warrantless National Security Agency wiretaps of Americans that Bush ordered. But such blind faith in government simply ignores the lessons of U.S. history. When the feds have ...

The FISA Farce

by James Bovard January 9, 2006

President Bush proudly announced last month that he is violating federal law. He declared that in 2002 he ordered the National Security Agency to begin conducting warrantless wiretaps and email intercepts on Americans. He asserted that the wiretaps would continue, regardless of the law. Bush claims that he must ignore the law because the secret federal court created to authorize ...

Free Speech on the Ropes

by James Bovard January 1, 2006

The First Amendment states that “Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech.” The Founding Fathers could have done nothing to make it clearer that the government has no right to gag the American people. However, in recent years, the Constitution is proving little or no barrier ...

Democracy versus Freedom

by Jarret B. Wollstein January 1, 2006

Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and conflict; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths. James Madison, fourth president of the United States and primary Framer of the U.S. Constitution Politicians and ...

Bush’s Secret Surveillance State

by Anthony Gregory December 26, 2005

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place ...

Wartime Attacks on Civil Liberties

by George Leef December 1, 2005

Perilous Times — Free Speech in Wartime by Geoffrey R. Stone (Norton, 2004); 730 pages; $35. If it is true to say, as Randolph Bourne did, that war is the health of the state, it is equally true to say that war is the ...

Southwest Airlines Did Not Censor

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 14, 2005

A recent decision by Southwest Airlines to throw two passengers, a husband and wife, off a flight holds a valuable lesson about private-property rights, censorship, and the Bill of Rights. The reason the couple was grounded was that one of them wore a t-shirt containing a photo of President Bush, ...

Book Review: Reclaiming the American Revolution

by George Leef September 1, 2005

Reclaiming the American Revolution: The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions and Their Legacy by William J. Watkins Jr. (Independent Institute, 2004); 236 pages; $39.95. How do you devise a system of limited government that actually works? It is easy enough to put words ...

The NRA Gets It Wrong

by Sheldon Richman August 24, 2005

The concept of individual rights really isn’t complicated, but even some of its defenders get it wrong. Take, for example, the National Rifle Association (NRA). The NRA, of course, concentrates exclusively on the individual’s right to keep and bear arms, but that is no excuse for failing to ...

A Conflict of Paradigms

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 1, 2005

Understanding the true nature of a free society entails asking ourselves two basic questions: What does it actually mean to be free, and what is the legitimate role of government in a free society? Reflecting on those two fundamental questions might provide the way out of the ...