ALA: House Committee Revives Protections in Patriot Act Renewal

Bill passes 16-10 in committee, but must pass full House, Senate

Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 11/06/2009

• Increased protections for library, bookstore records
• More safeguards regarding gag orders
• Further debate coming in House
• Senate committee passed narrower reforms

While the American Library Association has expressed dismay that Senate Judiciary Committee did not reform the USA PATRIOT Act sufficiently, the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee has passed the USA PATRIOT Amendments Act of 2009, praised by ALA and the Association of Research Libraries (ARL).

“Chairman [John] Conyers and other leaders in the House Judiciary Committee conducted a thorough, open debate of H.R. 3845,” ALA President Camila Alire said. “The weak bill the Senate released after closed-door negotiations would not provide library patrons with privacy online, but H.R. 3845 includes many provisions that will re-establish the balance between the needs of law enforcement and the rights of the American public.”

New provisions
H.R. 3845, which passed 16-10, would restore reader privacy, ALA said, "by curbing the use of secret court orders and National Security Letters [NSLs] to obtain library and bookstore records about innocent people." It also would give those receiving gag orders more opportunity to challenge them in court and to have more thorough judicial review of those orders.

According to the Judiciary Committee:

• Under the bill, the government will no longer be able to use national security letters to demand information merely by claiming it is "relevant" to national security.  Instead, the government must have concrete facts showing that the information is connected to a terrorist or foreign agent before issuing a national security letter to get it.


• Additionally, the unnecessary "lone wolf" provision is allowed to sunset. This provision has never been used and intelligence experts believe the information can be obtained through ordinary warrants.


• Finally, this bill includes important new reporting, audit, and oversight provisions that will ensure Congress will continue to get the information needed for real congressional oversight of the executive’s surveillance operations.