Warrants Quotes

President George W. Bush had ignored a federal law and tapped the phones of Americans without probable cause and a warrant issued by a court. The President’s defenders argued that the President, as Commander in Chief, has the Constitutional responsibility to lead the military and protect the nation. Intelligence gathering is part of military activity. Therefore the intelligence gathering is a Constitutional duty and the Congress, under the separation of powers doctrine, may not interfere with the President’s Constitutional Duty to conduct intelligence. Under this doctrine, the President need not obey laws that he believes impinge on his management of the war effort and the defense of the nation. Most legal scholars believe that this argument is nonsense, but the George W. Bush administration has stated the doctrine and it was the subject of much litigation.

This is a great example of Presidential stonewalling of Congress. The legislative branch is often exercising its oversight role and demanding executive department documents which for various reasons the President does not want the Congress to see. In this case, almost all attorneys would have said that the Congress was entitled to see the documents. This set a precedent of de facto Executive Privilege for war time. However, Congress very often has used their power of demanding documents for political and ideological reasons and not for the better functioning of the government. In the Eisenhower administration the concept of Executive Privilege was formalized to protect President Eisenhower and officials in the Executive Branch from the abuses and excesses of Joseph P. McCarthy who was a fanatic, ideologue and an alcoholic at the same time. See {595900}.

Historically, the Privacy Issues have taken a long time to be reflected in laws or regulations. Technologists are far ahead of the lawyers and politicians.

The George W. Bush administration started a secret program to scan phone calls of Americans without a court order or a warrant in the midst of the War on Terror. New York Times uncovered the illegal program and then the President tried to justify it.

In the aftermath of 9-11, a few government agencies violated the law and civil rights of a number of “Muslims” and/or “Middle Eastern looking” individuals and held them incommunicado with no charges and no warrants. The rationale of those agencies is that they “could not take a chance as lives were at stake. In most major wars in America, there has been an “overreaction” by some officials.