“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” — Benjamin Franklin

As the name implies, the USA Patriot Act is meant to ignite the passion of a nation that is willing to defend its ideals against those who wish to destroy it. To be a patriot is to show love and loyal support for one’s country, and an act bearing such a foreboding title would seem, on the surface, to be a true upholder of the ideals of that nation.

Unfortunately, the current USA Patriot Act is full of inconsistencies with our ideologies. As many Americans are beginning to see, the hastily written legislation that was passed before Congress shortly after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, is, in many instances, a direct violation of the ideals its name implies it to uphold.

Several sections have stirred a great deal of controversy, including: Section 213, which permits the use of “sneak and peek” delayed notification search warrants; section 215, which gives law enforcement agencies access to a wide array of personal records including library, medical and educational recor’s; and section 415, which allows for the indefinite detention of non-citizens certified by the Attorney General as terrorists.

The act also gives the Department of Justice the ability to monitor attorney client conversations, gives FBI agents unprecedented access to sensitive, personal records as well as any “tangible things” it feels necessary to confiscate, all the while allowing the information to be withheld from the public.

Under the protection of section 215, the government is able to obtain personal records or things from anyone from libraries, hospitals, Internet service providers or any business merely by asserting that the items are sought for an ongoing investigation.

Under the protection of the secret and mysterious Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, prosecutors are able to obtain search warrants or wiretaps with virtually no opposition.

Since its inception 25 years ago, FISC has never denied a government application for a wiretap or search in more than 14,000 requests. Last year, the seven judges on the court granted almost as many warrants as the 600 or so trial judges in the entire federal judiciary. The FISC hears only one side of the case-the government’s. No defense attorney or member of the public has ever attended one of its sessions.

According to the current drafting of the Patriot Act, my aimless ranting in a college newspaper could, by all reasonable standards, be considered grounds for an investigation in which my computer, telephone, bank statements and all other affiliations could be monitored without my consent or even notification.

These obvious violations of our basic rights as Americans have not gone unnoticed. In reality, it is no longer the “card-carrying ACLU members,” or the “liberal mouthpieces trying to find something wrong with the Republican administration” that are mounting opposition to the USA Patriot Act.

In Alaska, the GOP-controlled legislature overwhelmingly passed a measure that urges Congress to fix the violations of civil liberties under the act. They even went so far as to order Alaskan law enforcement agencies not to cooperate with federal agents “in the absence of reasonable suspicion of criminal activity under Alaska State Law.”

Alaska is not alone in its battle against the Patriot Act. Three other states-Hawaii, Oregon, and Vermont- have passed similar resolutions. In Vermont, the resolution went unanimously through the senate and through a Republican-controlled house. Across the country more than 150 counties and cities, including Philadelphia, have also adopted resolutions denouncing the Patriot Act.

The most vocal group in this onslaught of opposition has been the conservative American Library Association, which has firmly opposed the Patriot Act sections touching libraries. According to Emily Sheketoff, the Washington associate director of the ALA, before the Patriot Act, “library records were sacrosanct. The courts had recognized that there was a direct relationship between freedom of speech, privacy rights and your reading records.”

The onslaught of opposition to the Patriot Act has inspired many politicians to take strong stances against its constitutional violation. Democratic front-runner Howard Dean has vowed to repeal the unconstitutional portions of the act while his primary opponent in the race, Gen. Wesley Clark, has taken an even stronger stance with his “New American Patriotism” in which he vehemently opposes the act entirely.

The fight against the USA Patriot Act has reached the mainstream. It is no longer the subject of liberal criticism; Americans are realizing now more than ever the all-encompassing power the act has on their lives. A May CBS News poll found that 52 percent of Americans were “very concerned” or “somewhat concerned” about losing their civil liberties at the hands of the Administration.

As the heat of the Iraqi war has cooled and terrorism threats dwindled, it is time for Americans to revisit this sloppy legislation and demand that their government become accountable to its citizens by repealing the USA Patriot Act, eliminating the shroud of secrecy involving search and seizure warrants, looking towards a more constitutional and Patriotic way in which we address problems of domestic terrorism.

Richie Brown is a columnist for The Daily Nebraskan, the University of Nebraska student newspaper. This column appeared on U-Wire.