Letter: Patriot Act can’t be permanent

Friday, Sept. 9, 2005 | 10:05 a.m.

While the media is focused on the construction of an Iraqi Constitution, little, if any, attention is being paid to the destruction of our own.

The House of Representatives voted in the last session of Congress to make permanent provisions of the Patriot Act that would severely curtail our civil liberties. While there was some excuse after the 9/11 attacks for members of Congress to hastily pass this assault on our Constitution, there is no excuse now.

Our elected officials to want to make permanent laws that allow the government to break into your home and search it and to find out what books you've been reading at a public library. Even if some of the provisions in the Patriot Act need to be kept in force for a few more years because the bad guys such as Osama bin Laden are still out there, there is no reason to make these laws permanent.

Will Americans stand by like sheep and allow this to happen? Thomas Jefferson once said, "Those who attempt to restrict liberty in the name of order, deserve neither and will lose both." We should remember those words and do everything we can to prevent the House version of the Patriot Act from becoming permanent law.

DON KIMBALL