Even in Wartime, Stealth and Democracy Do Not Mix
Commentary
By Charles Lewis
WASHINGTON, Feb. 12, 2003 -- A few days ago, the Center for Public Integrity
obtained a copy of draft legislation that the Bush Administration has quietly
prepared as a bold, comprehensive sequel to the USA Patriot Act. This proposed
law would give the government breathtaking new powers to further increase
domestic intelligence-gathering, surveillance and law enforcement prerogatives,
and simultaneously decrease judicial review and public access to information.
We took the unprecedented (for us) step of posting the entire bill on our Web
site. Why? Because democracy is supposed to be a contact sport, with many
and diverse participants, and we quickly discovered that practically no one on
Capitol Hill in either party or in the national news media had ever even heard of
the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003, much less read it. Senate
inquiries about the likelihood of "Patriot II" legislation have been publicly and
privately rebuffed for months, dozens of specific written questions to the Justice
Department about implementation of the first Patriot Act simply never answered.
In a national crisis atmosphere of fear, paranoia and patriotism in the wake of
September 11th, the Bush Administration introduced and got the Patriot Act
enacted into law almost unanimously in just a few weeks, warp speed for
Congress. The Senate Judiciary Committee had an hour and a half hearing in
which Attorney General John Ashcroft testified but took no questions. In the
House, meanwhile, there was no testimony from opponents of the bill.
So now, with troops amassing on the border of Iraq, we learn that for months the
staff of Attorney General John Ashcroft has been secretly planning another
tectonic shift in the historic constitutional balance between security and liberty,
further encroachments against the hard-earned, legally protected, right-to-know
about our government in this country. Was the Bush Administration waiting for
the bombs bursting in Baghdad to spring this latest, urgent, national security
legislation on the American people and Congress, another drive-by mooting of
our customary democratic discourse and deliberative processes? I don't know,
but it is certainly not an unfair question to ask, given recent events.
What seemed to be merely self-serving shenanigans by the latest occupant of
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in the months prior to September 11th actually now
appears to have been the dawn's early light of a wholesale assault on access to
information in this country.
It was before the worst terrorist act on American soil that George W. Bush, in his
last hours as governor of Texas, had his official records packed up and shipped
to his father's presidential library, attempting to remove them from the usual
custody of the Texas State Library and Archives and the strong Texas public
information law. Similarly, so was Vice President Richard Cheney's refusal to
release basic information about his meetings with energy company campaign
contributors on government time and property. So was the secret Justice
Department subpoena of Associated Press reporter John Solomon's telephone
records to attempt to learn the identity of a confidential source. The Reporters
Committee found that "the Justice Department did not negotiate with Solomon or
his employer, did not say why the reporter's phone records were essential to a
criminal investigation, and did not explain why the information could not be
obtained any other way."
In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Ashcroft issued a chilling memorandum
about the Freedom of Information, advising federal officials that "when you
carefully consider FOIA requests and decide to withhold records, in whole or in
part, you can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your
decisions unless they lack a sound basis or present an unwarranted risk of
adverse impact on the ability of other agencies to protect other important
records." Just three weeks later, with no fanfare or public debate, President Bush
signed Executive Order 13233, sharply restricting public access to the White
House documents of former presidents, including Ronald Reagan and his
father.
Within six months of the September 11 attacks, in no fewer than 300 separate
instances, federal, state and local officials restricted access to government
records by executive order or proposed new laws to sharply curtail their
availability, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Separately, in March 2002, the Washington Post reported that President Bush
secretly had dispatched roughly 100 senior civilian officials from every Cabinet
department and some independent agencies in a "shadow government" to live
and work at two secret, fortified locations outside Washington. Bush reportedly
implemented and maintained this classified "Continuity of Operations Plan" for
half a year without notifying Congress or the American people. Bush
acknowledged setting up the secret operation, which he said he had "an
obligation as the President" to do ". . . This is serious business."
So are secret trials and undisclosed detentions, DNA databanks and military
tribunals, expanded computer and other government surveillance, renewed
political spying by local police departments and preventing the Environmental
Protection Agency from distributing health and safety information about chemical
company facilities to the public. But now, with the full text online of the new
Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003, perhaps there can actually be a
public conversation about these measures.
I don't know why this President and his appointees have such an unhealthy,
Nixonian obsession with secrecy, such disdain for providing information to the
public. Arrogantly stonewalling and stiff-arming entirely reasonable requests for
information from Congress and journalists merely stoke the fires of skepticism,
suspicion and distrust.
Abraham Lincoln once said, "I'm a firm believer in the people. If given the truth,
they can meet any national crisis. The great point is to give them the real facts."
The Bush Administration needs to recall the advice of America's most revered
president, the first Republican to occupy - and win re-election - to the White
House.
Charles Lewis is the founder and executive director of the Center for Public Integrity in
Washington. Adam Mayle contributed research. To write a letter to the editor for publication,
e-mail letters@publicintegrity.org. Please include a daytime phone number.
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