Bush OKd for Curbing Rights After 9/11

Bush OKd for Curbing Rights After 9/11
March 03, 2009
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - After the Sept. 11 attacks the Bush administration determined that certain constitutional rights would not apply as the U.S. stepped up its response to terrorism, according to documents released to the public for the first time.

In nine legal opinions disclosed Monday by the Obama administration, the Justice Department under President George W. Bush claimed exceptional search-and-seizure powers. Within two weeks of the 2001 attacks, government lawyers were discussing ways to wiretap U.S. conversations without warrants.

Also revealed by the Obama administration in court documents Monday: The CIA destroyed nearly 100 videotapes - far more than previously known - of interrogations and other treatment of terror suspects. Congressional Democrats and other critics have charged that some of the harsh interrogation techniques amounted to torture, a contention that Bush and other officials rejected.

The Bush administration eventually abandoned many of the legal conclusions, but the documents themselves had been closely held. By releasing them, President Barack Obama continued a house-cleaning of the Bush administration's most contentious policies.

"Too often over the past decade, the fight against terrorism has been viewed as a zero-sum battle with our civil liberties," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a speech as the documents were being prepared for release. "Not only is that school of thought misguided, I fear that in actuality it does more harm than good."


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