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The War on the Bill of Rights—and the Gathering Resistance
"The Constitution," said Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia ominously in March 2003, "just sets minimums. Most of the rights that you enjoy go way beyond what the Constitution requires." In The War on the Bill of Rights-and the Gathering Resistance, nationally syndicated columnist and Village Voice mainstay Nat Hentoff draws on untapped sources-from reporters, resisters, and civil liberties law professors across the country to administration insiders-to piece together the true dimensions of the ongoing assault on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
176 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2003
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About the author
Nat Hentoff
124 books42 followersNathan Irving "Nat" Hentoff was a historian, novelist, music critic, and syndicated columnist. As a civil libertarian and free-speech activist, he has been described by the Cato Institute—where he has been a senior fellow since 2009—as "one of the foremost authorities on the First Amendment" to the U.S. Constitution. He was a staff writer for The New Yorker for over 25 years, and was formerly a columnist for The Village Voice for over 50 years, in addition to Legal Times, The Washington Post, The Washington Times, and The Progressive, among others. Since 2014, he has been a regular contributor to the conservative Christian website WorldNetDaily, often in collaboration with his son Nick Hentoff.
Hentoff was a Fulbright Fellow at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1950 and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in education in 1972. The American Bar Association bestowed the Silver Gavel Award in 1980 for his columns on law and criminal justice, and five years later his undergraduate alma mater, Northeastern University, awarded him an honorary Doctorate of Law degree. While working at the Village Voice in 1995, the National Press Foundation granted him the W.M. Kiplinger Distinguished Contributions to Journalism Award. He was a 1999 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Commentary, "for his passionate columns championing free expression and individual rights," which was won by Maureen Dowd. In 2004 he became the first non-musician to be named an NEA Jazz Master by the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts.
Hentoff lectured at many colleges, universities, law schools, elementary, middle and high schools, and has taught courses in journalism and the U.S. Constitution at Princeton University and New York University. He serves on the Board of Advisors of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (F.I.R.E.) and is on the steering committee of the Reporters' Committee for the Freedom of the Press.
Hentoff was a Fulbright Fellow at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1950 and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in education in 1972. The American Bar Association bestowed the Silver Gavel Award in 1980 for his columns on law and criminal justice, and five years later his undergraduate alma mater, Northeastern University, awarded him an honorary Doctorate of Law degree. While working at the Village Voice in 1995, the National Press Foundation granted him the W.M. Kiplinger Distinguished Contributions to Journalism Award. He was a 1999 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Commentary, "for his passionate columns championing free expression and individual rights," which was won by Maureen Dowd. In 2004 he became the first non-musician to be named an NEA Jazz Master by the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts.
Hentoff lectured at many colleges, universities, law schools, elementary, middle and high schools, and has taught courses in journalism and the U.S. Constitution at Princeton University and New York University. He serves on the Board of Advisors of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (F.I.R.E.) and is on the steering committee of the Reporters' Committee for the Freedom of the Press.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 30, 2008
The US Constitution, specifically the Bill of Rights (the first ten Amendments) is supposed to be the law of the land. This book tells how, since 9/11, it has been shredded by the USA PATRIOT Act, in the name of security.
It is now legal for the government to search a person’s home without informing the person being searched. It doesn’t pertain to just “terrorism” cases; it can now apply to all criminal cases. The Fourth Amendment’s provision concerning reasonable searches and seizures has been subverted. The standard of “probable cause” required to obtain a warrant has been reduced to information that is “relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation” that somehow is linked to alleged terrorism.
This is not the first time the FBI has ignored the Bill of Rights. In the COINTELPRO program, from 1956 to 1971, the FBI infiltrated and manipulated civil rights, antiwar and other groups that were using the First Amendment to oppose government policies. The guidelines put in place to make sure it never happens again have been thrown out by John Ashcroft.
Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act allows the FBI to walk into libraries and bookstores and demand lists of books bought or read by people who are under suspicion. The bookstore or library is forbidden to tell anyone, including the subject of the visit, that such a search has taken place.
Many self-appointed enforcers of patriotism on local school boards have been commanding the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance every day. In some places, students are informed that they can refuse to stand and pledge as an act of conscience (courtesy of a 1943 US Supreme Court decision). Any person who does so can expect to be treated as a terrorist-lover and pariah.
Opposition to the PATRIOT Act has been growing, on both sides of the political spectrum, from the ACLU to Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum. More than 100 towns and cities, plus a couple of state legislatures, have passed laws against the Act, or forbidding local law enforcement from helping the federal government to enforce the Act within local boundaries.
Even if the things discussed in this book aren’t exactly news, this is still an excellent book. The chapters are short, it’s easy to read and pretty chilling, and the author is a long-time scholar on the Constitution, so he knows what he is talking about. Very much worth reading.
It is now legal for the government to search a person’s home without informing the person being searched. It doesn’t pertain to just “terrorism” cases; it can now apply to all criminal cases. The Fourth Amendment’s provision concerning reasonable searches and seizures has been subverted. The standard of “probable cause” required to obtain a warrant has been reduced to information that is “relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation” that somehow is linked to alleged terrorism.
This is not the first time the FBI has ignored the Bill of Rights. In the COINTELPRO program, from 1956 to 1971, the FBI infiltrated and manipulated civil rights, antiwar and other groups that were using the First Amendment to oppose government policies. The guidelines put in place to make sure it never happens again have been thrown out by John Ashcroft.
Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act allows the FBI to walk into libraries and bookstores and demand lists of books bought or read by people who are under suspicion. The bookstore or library is forbidden to tell anyone, including the subject of the visit, that such a search has taken place.
Many self-appointed enforcers of patriotism on local school boards have been commanding the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance every day. In some places, students are informed that they can refuse to stand and pledge as an act of conscience (courtesy of a 1943 US Supreme Court decision). Any person who does so can expect to be treated as a terrorist-lover and pariah.
Opposition to the PATRIOT Act has been growing, on both sides of the political spectrum, from the ACLU to Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum. More than 100 towns and cities, plus a couple of state legislatures, have passed laws against the Act, or forbidding local law enforcement from helping the federal government to enforce the Act within local boundaries.
Even if the things discussed in this book aren’t exactly news, this is still an excellent book. The chapters are short, it’s easy to read and pretty chilling, and the author is a long-time scholar on the Constitution, so he knows what he is talking about. Very much worth reading.
March 29, 2008
Important.
March 2, 2009
There was some very valuable information in this book but it was presented in a very dry, boring way.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews