Library association chief takes on gag rule

By Scott Harris

posted October 14, 2005

As the nation focuses on Harriet Miers, Pres. Bush’s nominee to fill the critical Supreme Court seat of retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the court has been asked to intervene in a challenge to a controversial provision of the USA PATRIOT Act.

The case originated in Bridgeport, CT, where a library was served with a “national security letter” demanding private records related to an FBI terrorism or espionage investigation.

A consortium of librarians known as “John Doe” and represented by the American Civil Liberties Union challenged the government’s right to impose a gag rule preventing them from identifying themselves and publicly expressing opposition to the PATRIOT Act provisions that allow the government to secure library patron records, regardless of the patron’s involvement in illegal activity.

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