Rare News Desk
FreedomWorks Matt Kibbe, Senator Rand Paul and former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli announced a class action lawsuit against the National Security Agency on February 12.
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The class action lawsuit against the National Security Agency, organized by Senator Rand Paul, libertarian activist group FreedomWorks and others, has the potential to answer one of the most important questions in American politics: Does the federal government have unconstrained control over the private lives of its citizens?
If the answer is yes, then we no longer live in a free country.
There is no reasonable legal defense of the NSA’s metadata collection policies. The NSA spying on every single American is exactly the kind of government action the Fourth Amendment was designed to prevent.
This controversy has become a problem for the Obama administration, whose hypocrisy on the issue knows no bounds. If the lawsuit proceeds and the courts side with the government, there will no longer be such thing as privacy in American life.
Every communication we engage in will be under the jurisdiction of the government. This is a horrifying thought.
The use of general search warrants by the NSA to spy on American citizens is unconstitutional any way you cut it. The intent of the Fourth Amendment is spelled out in black and white:
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 to be searched, and the person or things to be seized.
This amendment was obviously written for warrants to be used on an individual basis. One cannot argue with any credibility that this applies to a large group of people, most of whom have not been accused or suspected of a crime.
In the debate of privacy vs. security, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham has said, “I think collecting data is not a Fourth Amendment activity if it’s related to gathering intelligence to prevent a terrorist attack.”
If this is what Senator Graham actually believes, then he has no substantive understanding of the Constitution. The threat of terrorism does not void the protection provided by the Bill of Rights. If this were the case, the Fourth Amendment would lose any authority it had left and merely be ceremonial.
It was precisely in times of war or alarm that liberty is lost, and the written charter that is our Constitution was designed specifically to protect our rights.
The fact that the government saw fit to keep the NSA’s metadata collection secret is a significant red flag. The Obama administration has defended the NSA and its policies:
Information of the sort described in the Guardian article has been a critical tool in protecting the nation from terrorist threats to the United States, as it allows counterterrorism personnel to discover whether known or suspected terrorists have been in contact with other persons who may be engaged in terrorist activities, particularly people located inside the United States.
Judging by this statement, the Obama administration views the NSA’s actions as legal and necessary, which begs the question; why didn’t the federal government, the NSA, or the White House acknowledge that these activities were going on until they were exposed by Edward Snowden?
There is no denying that this case will set a very serious precedent with regards to the protection provided to American citizens by the Fourth Amendment. While safety and security should always remain a priority for the federal government, in this case they have strayed far from the original intent of the Constitution and could potentially cost the American people one of their most fundamental civil liberties; privacy.
If we lose that, we lose the basis of our day-today freedoms, for a more “secure” America that would look a lot less beautiful than the one we surrendered.
