Re: DOE Tells Colleges OK to Give FBI Student Info w/o Subpoena

At 10:54 PM 9/24/2001 -0700, you wrote:
>http://chronicle.merit.edu/free/2001/09/2001092101n.htm


Have the slippery slopes begun?  They're basically saying that under a 
"health or safety emergency", records can be given out.  Okay, that perhaps 
is acceptable for now.  But since this "war" is likely to continue for many 
years, it also gives the FBI the ability to avoid getting any subpoenas 
while this war is on, needing to say no more than "it's related to the 
terrorism investigation, sir/ma'am".

A good example is what happened at Montgomery College (from the above 
Chronicle article):
 >>>
         George Hill, the registrar of Auburn University at Montgomery, 
said the chief of the campus police contacted him on the morning of 
September 11, shortly after the attacks, and said that the Alabama Bureau 
of Investigation wanted the names of all foreign students who were enrolled 
at the university and their countries of their origin.
         Mr. Hill handed over a list of about 89 students to the bureau. 
The agency was working in cooperation with the FBI, he added.
<<<

Simply being born in a foreign country is not "just probable cause".  I'm 
sure these requests would have been rejected by a judge if a subpoena had 
been required.

I think there is a growing need for some oversight committees to be set 
up.  I was glad to hear that some of the US reps listening to Ashcroft's 
request for more FBI leeway were concerned about potential loss of civil 
liberties and individual freedom.

There probably are old areas of the law which should be changed to expedite 
the ability of law enforcement to  investigate and apprehend 
terrorists.  But US citizens and our leaders must be vigilant not only for 
terrorists, but also for breeches of Constitutional rights.  There appears 
to be plenty the FBI/CIA/NSA/DSA/etc can do more efficiently both within 
their departments under current law and by talking with each other before 
we need to wholesale our rights in fear.  To do so, even in the name of 
security, only adds another chalkmark in the terrorist's column, scrawled 
on the scoreboard by our own hand...

-g