The Chicagoland Coalition for Civil Liberties and Rights (CCCLR) is a coalition of groups and individuals opposed to government activities that infringe upon civil liberties and civil rights. We seek to educate and organize local communities around these rights and how they are suppressed in times of fear. We are committed to defending the rights of citizens and non-citizens, including those of minorities who are disproportionately affected by repressive legislation. We are committed to opposing legislation such as the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, the 2001 USA Patriot Act, the 2002 Homeland Security Act and related Executive Orders.

We acknowledge the duty of the government to provide for the public safety of its citizens. The above legislation and related Executive Orders do not add to the safety of US citizens or those residing in our country. If anything, they eliminate our safety against repressive governmental actions. Instead, we find in these acts and orders a breach of the Bill of Rights and its guarantees.

The 1996 laws allow for long-term detentions of individuals and guts the writ of habeas corpus that protects against unlawful restraint or imprisonment. Removing this protection clearly opens the door to the abuses now being documented at Guantanamo Bay.

The USA PATRIOT Act compromises the first, fourth, fifth and sixth amendments.
· It allows certain domestic labor or civil rights demonstrations to be classified as “terrorism” if the government says they “appear to be intended … to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion”, in breach of the first amendment’s right to assembly.
· It lets the government get individuals’ medical, mental health, financial and school records, reversing the fourth amendment’s right to be secure “in their persons, houses, papers and effects”.
· It lets the government spy on what books individuals buy or check out of the library and where they go on the Internet, also in breach of the fourth’s right to security.
· It allows government agents to search individuals’ homes without telling them until later, removing the fourth amendment’s shield against unreasonable search and seizure.
· It lets the government lock up immigrants indefinitely without charges and in secret, in breach of the fifth amendment’s protection against imprisonment without “due process of law” and in breach of the sixth amendment’s right to be informed of the nature and cause of an accusation or charge.

The USA PATRIOT Act effectively repeals the fourth amendment by eliminating the need for “probable cause” for an investigation.

The USA PATRIOT Act allows the Executive Branch’s use of surveillance that were initially removed from them as a result of the 1975-76 Church Hearings that documented extraordinary federal abuse, like the Watergate burglaries and spying on Martin Luther King.

The USA PATRIOT Act allows the procedures used against foreign spies to be used against US citizens. This is the real effect of what the government calls “breaking down the wall” between intelligence gathering and criminal investigations.

Justice Thurgood Marshall said, “History teaches that grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure. The World War II relocation-camp cases, and the Red Scare and McCarthy-era internal subversion cases, are only the most extreme reminders that when we allow fundamental freedoms to be sacrificed in the name of real of perceived exigency, we invariably come to regret it.”

The Chicagoland Coalition for Civil Liberties and Rights believe we are there now, that our fundamental freedoms have been sacrificed. We see this through the misuse of the USA PATRIOT Act and through the abuses of Guantanamo Bay and its direct heir, Abu Ghraib. We have much to do. Let’s begin by allowing the sunset provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act to expire. Let’s repeal the USA PATRIOT Act. Let’s reclaim our freedoms.