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Volume 40, Issue 14
May 6, 2003
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May 6, 2003
Homeland’s Ashcroft opposes civil liberties
By Carly Schorman
News Editor
America has many enemies.
Some hold power in our own government.
John Ashcroft was met with vehement opposition when he was nominated by
President Bush for the office of attorney general.
When he was named Director of the Department of Homeland Security civil
liberties advocates cringed.
Their fears were justified.
Ashcroft is known to stand in opposition to affirmative action and same-sex
marriages, as well as expanding hate crime classification to include gender,
sexual orientation, and disability.
However, he does support abolishing special funding for businesses run
by minorities and women and making desecration or burning the American
flag a crime.
The former Missouri governor and senator lost his re-election campaign
in his own state.
Ashcroft was described in the San Francisco Chronicle as, “a cheerleader
for the death penalty—opposed to any expansion of hate-crimes laws,”
by Earl Ofari Hutchinson.
The lost office was believed to be the result of disapproval of a black
judge for a seat on the federal bench.
Following remarks made by Ashcroft, he received less than 20 percent of
votes from African-Americans.
Many others decided to vote against him as well, because, as Hutchinson
claims, voters wanted, “to punish him for his Stone-Age stance on
civil rights.”
Despite his failure to hold office in Missouri, Ashcroft received nomination
for U.S. attorney general from George W.
People for the American Way demanded that Ashcroft not be considered for
the office of U.S. attorney general.
“Ashcroft does not meet the high standards of fairness and integrity
required of the Attorney General,” the group’s leader, Ralph
Neas, stated.
Nonetheless, he was put into office.
During a Senate confirmation meeting in January 2001, Sen. Schumer asked
Ashcroft, “Will you now use, as U. S. attorney general, that office
to continue crusading against those you passionate and fervently disagree
with?”
When you have been such a zealous and impassioned advocate for so long,
how do you just turn it off?
Ashcroft continued to gain power following the terrorist attacks in the
United States with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security
to which he was appointed director.
His first exercises of new power were quickly questioned.
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a class action lawsuit
against Ashcroft on behalf of the Middle Easterners that were detained
after Sept. 11.
The group said, “Instead of being presumed innocent until proven
guilty, the post 9/11 detainees have been presumed guilty of terrorism
until proven innocent to the satisfaction of law enforcement authorities.”
Immigrants will not be released without bond with no needed reason stronger
then Ashcroft’s discretion.
Over 1,000 Muslims were arrested following the attack mainly for “minor
immigration violations.”
Over 300 were still being detained five months later.
These same individuals reported abuse from authorities such as strip-searches
and physical assaults.
A lawyer for the CCR claimed prisoners “were forced to sleep in their
cells for 24 hours and their sleep was constantly interrupted. They were
cavity strip-searched every time they had to leave their cell in manacles.”
Another detainee said he was kicked in the face and had his head bashed
into a wall during his four month stay at a detention center following
a judge’s order for him to be deported.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also filed suit because the
Justice Department has “declined to identify the detainees or explain
why so many remain in prison.”
Ashcroft’s response to complaints?
He forbid “non-federal authorities from releasing information about
immigration detainees” in a regulation issued last April.
Let us take a moment to reflect on what happens when Americans allow the
civil rights of others to be overlooked to supposedly protect them . .
. During World War II, concentration camps were built in Arizona and filled
with thousands of Japanese Americans. Everyone today agrees.
That was a bad idea.
President Lincoln allowed the arrest of anyone local and military officials
seen as a potential threat during the Civil War.
Among the arrests made, a number were based on tips from unnamed sources
later found to be means for settling disputes or seeking revenge.
This was another bad idea.
Why are we allowing this man to continually ignore constitutional rights
or even basic human rights?
Other elected, not appointed as Ashcroft was, politicians have questioned
his actions and abuse of power and office.
When it was revealed that Ashcroft was monitoring conversations between
attorneys and their clients, which are protected by the Sixth Amendment,
Senate Committee on the Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy said, “I
am deeply troubled at what appears to be an executive effort to exercise
new powers without judicial scrutiny or statutory authorization.”
Leahy pointed out that the Supreme Court decided in United States v. Robel
that, “this concept of ‘national defense’ cannot be deemed
an end in itself, justifying any exercise of . . . power designed to promote
such a goal.”
Americans must assert their rights to maintain their freedom.
Everyone has a responsibility to demand our leaders act within the law
to insure the rights of every person.
Ashcroft has consistently rejected the human rights defined by our constitution.
It is time to demand the freedom we supposedly have.
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