Collegiate Times

This past Thursday, the United States Congress passed legislation which extended several portions of the 2001 USA PATRIOT Act.

Upon hearing of its passage, President Obama was presented with a copy of the bill and proceeded to sign it into law using an autopen.

Perhaps the president’s need to use an autopen instead of his actual signature goes deeper than his mere inability to be present in Washington to physically sign the bill. Certainly there is no reason why he could not have taken more time to sign the bill.

In fact, a short-term expiration of the bill would not have in any sense hindered any ongoing investigations.

By using his autopen privilege, President Obama allowed for the same thoughtless swiftness which allowed for this act to be administered to this country in the first place. Is it possible that the president’s haste was directed less at protecting this nation’s security and more at glossing over his previously stated disagreements with the bill so he would be able to centralize more power in his office? There are fewer insults to the lives of those lost on September 11, 2001 than the passage of the PATRIOT Act.
  

On October 26, 2001, President Bush smugly signed this bill into law while he was a mere few miles away from the smoking rubble of the Pentagon and not too much farther from the ruins of the World Trade Center. Since that period, this government has expanded its authority in the executive far beyond Constitutional parameters and in the process, made a mockery of our rule of law. Taken with the other crimes of the Bush regime, the PATRIOT Act openly declared that the United States has done away with a legal and ethical tradition extending back to the 1215 signing of Magna Carta.

But beyond the legal ramifications of this government’s crimes against its people is the purely moral issue of using the corpses of our lost neighbors to bring about the ruin of our Constitution. And as if to add insult to injury, Mr. Bush and his congressional cronies had the audacity to name such a disgusting piece of legislation the ‘PATRIOT’ Act, as if insinuating that those against it were not loyal to this nation.

President Obama promised this country ‘Change’ and ‘Hope’ and yet with his criminal reauthorization of this legislation, he has proven himself to be little better than his predecessor. This nation is quite accustomed to our presidents conducting themselves with illegality yet not at such a mockingly public fashion. The president’s refusal to use his actual signature adds to the horror of his action by showing not merely his disrespect for our system of governance but moreso his weakness.

While I have often agreed with this president and feel that he has overall conducted himself in a manner becoming of his office, when he reauthorized this horrifying bill he showed himself to be no greater than the criminals who held his office before him. Principles only matter when they are difficult and dangerous to uphold. At the foundation of this nation, are the inalienable rights that all men have, most of all their right never to live in fear of their government.

By attempting to protect this nation the Bush Administration and Obama Administration have brought about the ruin of our Constitution. The document which was the only thing they promised to defend and protect when they assumed their office has been made a joke by their actions. And so the principles upon which this nation was founded upon and continued to have been brought to eradication by reckless nationalism and dictatorial fear-mongering.

Upon this week following Memorial Day, it is important to remember the voices of those who have died serving the flag of this nation. We can hear them call from Valley Forge and Gettysburg, to Normandy and Baghdad asking ‘have we given our lives for this?’ Have these brave men and women sacrificed their lives for a nation who carries no respect for the sanctity of our Constitution?

The time has come for us to seriously reflect upon this question and ask ourselves if we are willing to live in a world more dangerous if it means we can hold our heads with pride and say we stand by the principles which have guided a nation and a world.

A version of this article appeared in the Jun 2 issue of the Collegiate Times.