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February 14, 2006

Darkness is falling on civil liberties, ACLU leader warns Fletcher students

"This is the time to be outspoken - to get a critical mass of people who are willing to care about the Constitution," warns Nancy Murray, Director of the ACLU of Massachusetts' Bill of Rights Education Project, speaking at a lunch at The Fletcher School.

According to Murray, warrant-less wiretapping without court approval is a worrying reminder of the days when the FBI conducted surveillance on politicians and civil rights leaders.

Murray came to Fletcher on February 13th to speak to a packed room of Fletcher students and Tufts undergraduates. Her talk, titled “Civil Liberties and the War Against Terror – Whatever Happened to the Rule of Law?” was jointly sponsored by the Fletcher Human Rights Project and the Tufts ACLU.

Murray explained the legal implications of the current controversy over unauthorized domestic wiretapping, and explained why the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) sees the issue as part of a larger struggle to maintain constitutional safeguards and civil liberties.

According to Murray, the National Security Agency’s (NSA) domestic wiretapping should be seen in the context of a broad erosion of civil liberties since September 11Like the sky at twilight, she warns, the light of civil liberties in the United States is slowly, almost imperceptibly, being turned to darkness.

To highlight the intrusiveness and the level of secrecy the new regulations have imposed, Murray showed letters from an internet service company complaining about the NSA’s requirements to provide information. Most of the letter had been blacked out and censored before being released to the public.

Murray questions whether this aggressive strategy is actually yielding real results. “The vast majority of what the government claims are terrorism prosecutions have nothing to do with terrorism,” she said, pointing out that crimes like credit card fraud and paying others to take ESL exams have been filed as terrorism cases.

She also noted that the huge amount of information provided by domestic surveillance may be actually be hampering investigations – “They are putting more hay on the haystack, and that doesn’t help to find the needle.”

In this context, she warns, “I want you to exercise real scepticism when you see the government’s claims of success in fighting terrorism.”

“This country could be very different if we allow [these programs] to continue,” she warned, and urges students to stay informed and active, “There is so much going on now – work hard to find out what is happening.”

By Charles De Simone, MALD '07

Posted by jessica at February 14, 2006 10:12 AM