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Something More Of Us Need To Get In Touch With: Why We Fought The American Revolution In The First Place
Juan Cole posts on warrantless searches and how unreasonable searches of private documents caused the American Revolution:

At one time, Americans minded when the government usurped their rights and made over-reaching claims to be able to invade their privacy. No more.
Most Americans have become little more than bleating sheep, perfectly happy to be sheared by faceless bureaucrats. They are willing to surrender to the state their most private information, the contemporary electronic records of everywhere they go, who they talk to and for how long, who they email, and even the contents of their communications.

With the rise of datamining software, this information can be extremely revealing, and government and contractors with access to it can engage in all sorts of blackmail, insider trading, and corruption. Since the surveillance apparatus is "classified" and top secret, there is no effective oversight to ensure against public harm.

The Founding generation of Americans was particularly exercised by the privacy of their papers, the equivalent of today's email and electronic records. They put the Fourth Amendment into the Constitution, which says:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

He continues:

We need a privacy law in the United States that would settle these issues for electronic papers and reinforce the plain language of the Fourth Amendment, which is by now almost a dead letter.
The argument that we have to give away the 4th amendment because of "terrorism" is equally stupid. (King George III set aside the need for warrants and specific searches on the grounds of fighting "smuggling," the precedent for our current use of "terrorism" for this purpose). Charles Kurzman points out that there have only been 100 terrorist plots on US soil since 2008 and that the NSA only claims to have disrupted 10 of them through electronic surveillance. There have in those 5 years been 25,000 terrorist attacks worldwide, of which the NSA claims to have foiled 50 through electronic surveillance. So they are not actually so effective that we should be eager just to abrogate a whole amendment to the Constitution over it. And, moreover, there were 70,000 violent fatalities in the United States during this period since 2008, and 20 of those were owing to terrorism.

This is why I say those willing to kick the constitution to the curb over fear of "terrorism" are sheep, not bravehearts. And the government officials who issue thousands of 'national security letters' for warrantless searches every year and requisition Verizon business records on millions of customers, are frankly betraying the Constitution.

via @jhagel via @ATabarrok

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Comments

The Constitution is an incredibly subversive document. No surprise that entrenched interests want to minimize its influence.

Frank at July 4, 2013 11:04 AM

Quote this to anyone who bleats, "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about":

By allowing warrantless surveillance, you surrender even the possibility of leadership representing you, the individual, because those mining your data and searching you USE that information to prevent your actions. You will sit at home, doing what you are told. Won't you?

Radwaste at July 4, 2013 11:17 AM

If you read the Declaration of Independence and substitute D.C. for He (referring to King George) a lot would start to apply today.

Jim P. at July 4, 2013 12:13 PM

I just saw on the news today that the post office photographs, scans, and stores pictures of every single piece of mail sent.

BunnyGirl at July 4, 2013 12:17 PM