The Ghost of Edgar Hoover

FBI files are chilling
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/12196189.htm

Fri, Jul. 22, 2005
EDITORIAL

Back in the 1960s, under the guise of fighting communism, the FBI opened thousands of secret files on American citizens whose sole crime was to protest government policies that they found unjust.

Under COINTELPRO, a covert intelligence program, federal agents bugged people's homes, sent anonymous letters to their spouses about alleged marital infidelities and infiltrated pacifist organizations, creating havoc within their ranks.

The goal was to crush public opposition to the Vietnam War and destroy an emerging civil rights movement that J. Edgar Hoover feared might produce a "Black Messiah."

For those old enough to remember those dark times, there is a chilling sense of déjà vu.

Once again, the FBI is spying on anti-war protesters. Only this time, agency officials say it is part of the war on terrorism.

One prime FBI target is the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU has been a sharp critic of the USA Patriot Act, which expands law enforcement's powers of search and seizure at the expense of the individual protections guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.

The notion that the legal advocacy organization poses a threat to national security is absurd. The only weapon in its arsenal is the legal brief. Yet, the FBI has collected more than 1,000 documents on the ACLU's activities. The secret snooping came to light after the ACLU filed a Freedom of Information lawsuit against the agency.

As a result of the lawsuit, FBI officials were forced to admit that they were monitoring the ACLU, Greenpeace and other organizations.

So why is the FBI spending its time spying on these groups? Don't they have more important things to do? Like looking for the real terrorists?

Therein lies the $64,000 question. FBI officials refuse to elaborate, saying only that no one has been put under surveillance for merely practicing their constitutional right to free speech. That assurance rings hollow.

It all smacks of a disturbing pattern within the administration of labeling anyone who disagrees with the president as either un-American or a terrorist.

No one knows what is in the classified files. The FBI has stubbornly refused to release all but a handful and claims it will need another 10 months to review the ACLU documents before they can be released, which in our opinion is an unacceptable delay.

If, indeed, the administration is using the FBI to stifle public dissent, it is a scandalous abuse of power and goes against everything that our nation stands for.

Thirty years ago, a Senate select committee headed by Sen. Frank Church, D-Idaho, mandated sweeping changes at the FBI after COINTELPRO abuses came to light.

It became illegal for FBI agents to spy on U.S. citizens unless they had reasonable belief that an individual was engaged in criminal activity.

Said Church: "The American people need to be assured that never again will an agency of the government be permitted to conduct a secret war against those citizens it considers a threat to the established order."

It is our collective responsibility as Americans to hold our government accountable so that those kinds of unchecked abuses don't ever happen again.

If the FBI has legitimate reasons for collecting data on perfectly law-abiding U.S. citizens, then agency officials need to stop the snow job and tell us what they are, lickety-split.

 

Oh, "Peeping Tom" will now have a new moniker: "Sightseeing Jerry".