WASHINGTON, DC — The surveillance powers of the federal government continue to expand thanks to signing statement made by President George W. Bush on Wednesday, December 20th.The signing statement was one in a long string of such actions that Bush has performed during his terms in office. The December 20th statement was affixed to legislation that overhauls postal regulations and declares that the president has the right to read mail correspondences without seeking a warrant if he deems it necessary due to emergency circumstances. Experts say that places the president in opposition to current laws and, in fact, the bill that he had just signed.
White House representative Emily Lawrimore insists that the president has not given himself new powers and has, instead, merely articulated search rights already allowed by the Constitution. “In certain circumstances — such as with the proverbial ‘ticking bomb’ — the Constitution does not require warrants for reasonable searches,” she explained.
Bush’s signing statement, however, used the phrase “exigent circumstances,” and could easily include less obvious types of presumed but potentially ongoing danger.
Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA) is not reassured by such claims. The incoming House Government Reform Committee chairman, who co-sponsored the bill in question, went on record saying that “Despite the president’s statement that he may be able to circumvent a basic privacy protection, the new postal law continues to prohibit the government from snooping into people’s mail without a warrant.”
Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies in Washington also viewed the announcement with alarm, stating that “The signing statement claims authority to open domestic mail without a warrant — and that is new and quite alarming.”
Given that a year ago The New York Times disclosed a secret program wherein the federal government promoted warrantless monitoring of domestic phone calls and mail, fears of a continued and possibly illegal expansion of federal surveillance powers is not unreasonable and. According to the Seattle Times, the news continues to rock Capitol Hill insiders who fear the ever-increasing powers could easily be misused to collect large amounts of mail correspondence that have nothing to do with terrorism or other issues of national importance.
One senior U.S. official is said to have agreed that “You have to be concerned” and that “It takes executive-branch authority beyond anything we’ve ever known,” while a top Senate Intelligence Committee aide is said to have promised a review of the latest giant step in information harvesting. “It’s something we’re going to look into,” the Seattle Times quoted the aide as saying.
Although the majority of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act is related to changes in day-to-day operating procedures, it also clearly buttresses first-class mail protections, requiring court approval for searches. Bush, however, insisted that he could “construe” an exception, “which provides for opening an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection in a manner consistent… with the need to conduct searchest in exigent circumstances.” Examples of this included times when it was deemed necessarily in order to “protect human life and safety against hazardous materials and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection.”
Those opposed to the new — or merely more clearly specified — powers point out that the United States Postal Service can currently block delivery of mail and a warrant can quickly be obtained from a court or Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
