Massachusetts Can Affect Patriot Act Debate

What’s at Stake

Congress could give Bush what he wants: Not only would the Patriot Act become permanent, but certain portions of it would become even worse.  Or, Congress could pass the Senate compromise, which includes:

1. a meaningful standard of suspicion linking secret Patriot Act records orders to a suspected foreign terrorist or spy,
2. a meaningful right to challenge the secrecy of national security letters or “NSLs” (FBI records demands without any court review),
3. a rule requiring notice of secret searches in most general criminal cases after something considerably less than a month, and
4. a four-year “sunset” or expiration date on a few key powers so that another review can happen before the end of the decade.

It’s not everything we need, but it would be a very large step back from the brink, and a major defeat for Bush.

What is HB 1881?

The Resolution Affirming the Civil Rights and Liberties of the People of Massachusetts (click to read the full resolution) would put Massachusetts officially on the record in opposition to the post-9/11 civil liberties crackdown, and in support of meaningful Patriot Act reform on a federal level.

What Difference Can It Make?

A resolution is a political, not a legal tool.  Obviously, the Massachusetts legislature has no legal authority to reform federal law.  But the US Congress is at a tipping point, and the tenor of news coverage and public debate could tip them in either direction.  So could evidence of widespread political organization which may affect elections.  HB 1881 is in a position to highlight both.

Shortly after the Patriot Act first passed, local groups in communities around the country began organizing to pass local civil liberties resolutions in their cities, towns, and counties.  The national movement actually began here, with the Northampton-based Bill of Rights Defense Committee.  To date, over 400 such resolutions have been passed, evidence of a tremendous level of local organizing in almost every corner of the country.  Among these are seven state level resolutions, spanning the partisan spectrum from blue states to swing states to the reddest of the red: Hawaii, Vermont, Maine, Colorado, Montana, Alaska, and Idaho.

With the exception of Colorado, though, those are all states with small, mostly rural populations.  And it has been nearly a year since the most recent one (Colorado, May 2005).  Massachusetts is a very politically influential state.  It is densely populated, and actually has more people than all six of the states that passed resolutions before Colorado, combined.  By passing our own resolution now, we can bring the campaign back into the news.  We can provide the hook that newspapers need to tell the story, and remind the Congress of the broad, bipartisan, grassroots effort to reform the Patriot Act.  And we’re poised to do it at just the right time.

Why Your Calls Are The Key

HB 1881…

• Has over 40 co-sponsors
• Passed out of committee last fall with a favorable recommendation
• Was placed on the legislative calendar on January 9th
• Will probably pass with a strong majority if voted upon

But will it come to a vote?  And if so, when?

The legislative calendar is busy, and HB 1881 could languish there until it’s too late.  It’s up to Speaker DiMasi to decide, each morning, which bills off the calendar to consider that day.  It’s up to the other members of the legislature to ask for the bills they want.  And they’re only going to pay attention to this one, and ask for it to come to a vote, if they know we care.

It could happen any day.  It could happen tomorrow.  The hard work has already been done (and I intend to post a lot more about that soon).  Now’s the easy part.

State legislators don’t get a lot of calls.  Just two or three calls in one day to a member of the House about a bill like this, is more than enough to get him or her to take some action.  10 or 20 calls to DiMasi in one day, would be a landslide.  If we can generate that level of calls in the next few days, we can pass this bill.