For now, security trumps liberties

At times like this, a democracy must balance its need to protect itself with the freedoms that define it. Last week's terrorist attacks have raised the debate pitting homeland defense against civil liberties to a level not seen since World War II.

In the days since the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, the US Senate has passed a bill allowing enhanced police wiretap powers and more widespread use of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's "Carnivore" Internet-surveillance system. The number of businesses conducting criminal background checks on employees has shot up. Congress is pushing more now to ban encryption products, legitimately used to protect business secrets, but also available as a tool by terrorists and other lawbreakers.

Calls for racial and ethnic profiling in the name of domestic security are also increasing, as well as legislative proposals that would make it easier for government agencies to keep secrets. And there is likely to be expanded use of "face-recognition software" to scan everyday crowds for suspected criminals. Attorney General John Ashcroft says he wants to make it easier to detain foreigners, to wiretap phones, and to track money laundering.

Warren Goldstein, an American-history professor at the University of Hartford in Connecticut, predicts that government agencies will begin scanning subscription lists for magazines, newspapers, and journals, as well as watching online book purchases. "I think we're going to return with far greater electronic powers of surveillance to the kinds of things which were commonplace in the 1950s," he says.

Private businesses and organizations are also likely to increase their scrutiny of civilians.

Robert Mather, president of Pre-employ.com, Inc. in Redding, Calif., reports a doubling of calls from employers who want to conduct criminal background checks on employees. "In the past, it was mainly new hires that were checked," says Mr. Mather. "Many executives are now looking closely at their current policy and procedures and including current employees."

There's a historical pattern here. During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln suspended writs of habeas corpus, part of the due process for criminal defendants. After World War I, suspected anarchists were arrested without warrant, and immigrants were deported. During World War II, 77,000 American citizens of Japanese ancestry were imprisoned for the duration of the war solely because of their race. During the cold war, it was illegal to teach communism. And after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, new legislation allowed the use of secret evidence to deport people.

In retrospect, some of those acts were seen to have been wrong -legally questionable, if not unconstitutional - and based on unfounded fears.

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