On the floor of the Senate Thursday, Feingold compared the USA PATRIOT bill to other legislative misjudgments made in the name of national security, including "the Alien and Sedition Acts, the suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War, the internment of Japanese-Americans, German-Americans and Italian-Americans during World War II, the blacklisting of supposed communist sympathizers during the McCarthy era and the surveillance and harassment of antiwar protesters, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., during the Vietnam War."
That same day, Attorney General Ashcroft was describing the bill as essential for the task at hand. "Upon the president's signature" on the bill, the attorney general said, "I will direct investigators and prosecutors to begin immediately seeking court orders to intercept communications related to an expanded list of crimes under the legislation." Any communications regarding funding or supporting terrorism, or using biological or chemical agents, would be newly subject to new kinds of searches on the Internet, in voice mail, in bank records and elsewhere, Ashcroft said. The search warrants could for the first time be nationwide and not just focused on one particular area. He compared his task with former Attorney General Robert Kennedy's war on organized crime.
A day later, as Ashcroft's soldiers stood at attention, the president seemed to reflect the majority view when he said that the bill merely brought law enforcement to a more even playing field in their efforts to fight terrorism. "We're dealing with terrorists who operate by highly sophisticated methods and technologies, some of which were not even available when our existing laws were written," he said. "This government will enforce this law with all the urgency of a nation at war."
During the Friday ceremony in the East Room of the White House, Leahy took a snapshot of the actual signing of the bill over the president's left shoulder.
Hundreds of miles away in Wisconsin, Feingold was expressing his disappointment -- it sounded even a bit like disgust -- about the fact that he was the only one to vote against a bill that would be controversial at any other time. Gravely disappointed in the Democratic leadership, he said he was heartened by the positive response he was getting from Wisconsin editorial boards both liberal and conservative. The calls were coming into his office "pretty even" in favor and against his vote, he said, especially "given how difficult that vote was. Maybe more heat's coming, and I'm perfectly willing to accept that," he said. "I was just trying to look out for their individual rights."
He added that he's planning another maneuver that will no doubt endear him to Daschle and his colleagues -- to remove the automatic $4,900 pay raise senators plan on receiving in January 2002.
About the writer
Jake Tapper is Salon's Washington correspondent and the author of "Down and Dirty: The Plot to Steal the Presidency."
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