When America was viciously attacked by fundamentalists on September 11, 2001, the U.S. government responded by drafting legislation aimed at thwarting future terrorist efforts. The result was the Patriot Act. Since its enactment, however, it has fueled a debate in Washington as to whether its benefits outweigh its costs.
Is the Patriot Act a necessary instrument for finding and stopping terrorists or an excessive infringement on American civil liberties?
Consequently, former attorney general Ed Reese asked the major Republican presidential candidates at the most recent GOP debate whether they thought the investigative powers granted by the Patriot Act should be extended.
Here were their responses:
* Newt Gingrich: "I think ? the key distinction for the American people to recognize is the difference between national security requirements and criminal law requirements. It's desperately important that we preserve your right to be innocent until proven guilty, if it's a matter of criminal law. But if you're trying to find somebody who may have a nuclear weapon that they are trying to bring into an American city, I think you want to use every tool that you can possibly use to gather the intelligence.
"The Patriot Act has clearly been a key part of that. And I think looking at it carefully and extending it and building an honest understanding that all of us will be in danger for the rest of our lives. This is not going to end in the short run. And we need to be prepared to protect ourselves from those who, if they could, would not just kill us individually, but would take out entire cities."
* Ron Paul: "I think the Patriot Act is unpatriotic because it undermines our liberty. I'm concerned, as everybody is, about the terrorist attack. Timothy McVeigh was a vicious terrorist. He was arrested. Terrorism is still on the books, internationally and nationally, it's a crime and we should deal with it. We dealt with it rather well with Timothy McVeigh.
"But why I really fear it is we have drifted into a condition that we were warned against because our early founders were very clear. They said, don't be willing to sacrifice liberty for security. Today it seems too easy that our government and our congresses are so willing to give up our liberties for our security. I have a personal belief that you never have to give up liberty for security. You can still provide security without sacrificing our Bill of Rights."
* Mitt Romney: "There are different categories here. There's crime and there are rights that are afforded to American citizens under our Constitution and those that are accused of crime. Then there's war. And the tool of war being used today in America and around the world is terror. There's a different body of law that relates to war."
* Herman Cain: "Now, relative to the Patriot Act, if there are some areas of the Patriot Act that we need to refine, I'm all for that. But I do not believe we ought to throw out the baby with the bathwater for the following reason. The terrorists have one objective that some people don't seem to get. They want to kill all of us. So we should use every mean possible to kill them first or identify them first."
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