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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (May 1, 1980)
1 Portland Observer M ay 1. 1980 Page 3 Clarence Mitchell wins highest award SCLC and s u p p o rte rs m e rch to p ro te s t Klan vio le n c e SCLC protests Klan violence A tla n ta — M ore than 500 Southern C h ristian Leadership Conference (SC LC ) supporters marched through the streets n f W rightsville, Georgia demanding justice to r Blacks in that small- middle Georgia town. town. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, president o f SCLC, led the demonstrators to the Johnson C ounty Courthouse where he callenged Wrightsville and Johnson County officials to “ move out ot the past and into the present so Blacks and whites together can build a better future.'' The protestors marched despite the presence o f fully robed Ku Klux Klansmen and self-avowed white racist J.B. Stoner o f M arietta Georgia, who staged a counter protest just a few yards away from the SCLC demonstration. Assistant Attorney General Drew S. Days, III has announced that the Federal Bureau ot Investigation has been requested to investigage two separate incidents in which Black women and children were shot by persons identified as Ku Klux Klan members. Days, head o f the C ivil Rights D ivisio n , said the FBI w ill in vestigate the shootings o f four Black women from a passing automobile in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and the shooting o f a nine-year old girl in her mobile home in W’rightsville, Georgia. Mr. Days reiterated his concern over the alleged resurgence o f violence by persons identified with the Klan. He said the Justice Department is determined to in vestigate these incidents prom ptly and to prosecute vigorously where lederal laws have been violated. The President has announced that Clarence M itc h e ll, Jr. is a 1980 recipient o f the n a tio n ’ s highest civilia n honor, the Medal o f Freedom. The Presidental Medal o f Freedom was initiated In 1945 to recognize Am ericans who have made an especially meritorious con trib u tio n to “ (1) the security or national interests o f the United States, or (2) world peace, or (3) cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.” M itchell recently retired from his long time position as director o f the NAACP Washington Bureau. The awards ceremony is scheduled to take place at the White House on June 9. A d d itio n a l recipients are: Ansel Adams, photographer; the late Rachel Carson, scientist and author; Lucia Chase, director, American Ballet Theater; The late Hubert Humphrey, Vice President, U.S. Senator, and mayor; A rch bishop lakovos, Greek Orthodox Church o f N orth and South America. The late President Lyndon B. Johnson; Roger Tory Peterson, or n ith o lo g ist, a uthor; A d m ira l Hyman Rickover, director. 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Vancouver or 503 241 3723 Portland, OR MINNEHAHA BRANCH 47 St. Johns Road Vancouver, W A 98661 Phone 206-694-8577 Vancouver or 503 22341229 Portland, OR A secret federal court By Nat H en to ff telligence Surveillance Act o f 1978, the court consists o f seven Federal District judges and three Court o f Appeals judges. The latter are there in case the lower seven should ever deny a government request fo r a secret warrant. A ll appointments to the court are made by Chief Justice W arren Burger whose particular passion on the High Court has been to gut the F ourth Amendment because it gets in the way o f law- enforcement officials. As it surely does. the A t LU lay low rather than mount opposition to the bill setting PNS -- The reason we have a up the court. Fourth Amendment in the Bill o f According to the A C L U , the Rights is that the colonists had long gains it achieved included the first been prey to British revenue officers time a warrant tor electronic sur breaking into their homes bearing veillance has ever been mandated in general search warrants and then national security cases. Also, the bill rummaging wherever they willed. contains a system o f checks and The fie ry I Nth-century Mass- balances. The President has to ap achusettes law yer, James O tis, prove the overall program; the A t called this Habitual rape o f privacy torney General has to sign each "th e worst instrument o f arbitrary warrant; and there is congressional power, the most destructive o f oversight over the whole m urky English lib e rty ...th a t was ever process. Previously, says the found in an English law book.” A C L U , there were no checks and A nd so, once there was an balances. The President, by in American constitutional law, the voking “ national security,” did F ourth Am endm ent guaranteed what he pleased in this area. “ the right o f the people to be secure In return, the AC LU became an in their persons, houses, papers, and accomplice in the setting up o f a effects against unreasonable sear system o f surveillance through the Called the Foreign Intelligence ches and seizures.” Warrants would authorization of a court which acts Surveillance Court, this new body - only be issued ‘ ‘ upon probable in secret in conjunction only with which only sees government agents cause.. .particularly describing the the government. The citizen being and government lawyers - currently place to be searched, and the per tracked not only cannot defend has jurisdiction solely over govern sons or things to be seized.” And, himself against these surveillance ment requests fo r electronic sur o f course, the o ffic ia l in tru d e r orders but he is never allowed to veillance warrants that have to do would have to show that warrant to know that he is being spied on -- w ith foreign intelligence. Like be let in. unless he is prosecuted. wiretaps, video recordings, pen As for the alleged safeguards, the During the nearly two centuries registers (a device on your phone history ot the Presidency, regardless that have passed, the F ourth that tells what numbers you call), ot party, provides no probable Amendment has been considerably some o f these counter-intelligence cause to believe that any President bent by lawless cops and law ful requests involve American sur or A ttorney General even thinks courts. But now, the Carter ad veillance from the inside o f foreign about the Fourth Amendment in m in is tra tio n , in its zeal to embassies here; others are directed such cases. Congressional oversight, “ unleash” the C IA and other in at “ suspect” indigenous Americans. moreover, is bound to be illusory telligence agencies, intends to fur As an indication o f the “ indepen because how can any member o f ther d ilu te what is left o f the dence” ot this court, the Congress on the relevant com m it citizen’s right to privacy. Washington Post reported in a small tees determine for himself whether Legislation now in Congress item on an inside page on March 4 the FBI, the C IA , or any intelligence would, the American Civil Liberties that during its first nine months o f agency is giving true inform ation Union claims, “ authorize the in work (it was late getting started), the about whether someone must be telligence community to go to court secret court “ has granted every wiretapped. Is each member going and get an order p e rm ittin g in government request to use wiretaps, to send out his own investigators? telligence agents to open mail or bugs, and other electronic sur Nonetheless, the A C L U m ain break in to home o f Am erican veillance in foreign intelligence tains that it had to accept the secret citizens in the middle o f the night to cases.” court “ because we thought we had steal th e ir papers. The warrants Am ong the ways in which this no better choice.” would not be served. eerie tribunal differs from all others It does not appear to have much “ That is, they would not have to is that no notice need ever be given concerned the A C L U that all be produced. No notice would be to someone being e le ctronically wiretapping and other forms o f elec given. No list o f items seized would tracked - unless he is brought to tronic surveillance - with or without be provided." prosecution. By contrast, under a secret court — inherently violate So says House B ill HR 6588, a Title III o f the Omnibus Crime Con the F ourth Am endm ent. In his companion measure to Senate bill S. trol and Safe Streets Act (1968), the prescient dissent in the first wiretap 2284, the National Intelligence Act. targets of all other wiretaps and case to reach the Supreme Court, Not all citizens, it should be noted, electronic surveillance - from the Olmstead v. United States (1928), would be subjected to having their M afia to sticky-fingered Justice Louis Brandeis noted that homes legally buglarized. Only Congressmen -- must be given "th e right to be let alone - the most those suspected o f w orking for notice, sooner or later, that the comprehensive o f rights and the foreign powers, (o f course, it was government has been watching and right most valued by civilized men” exactely this sort o f floating listening to them. I f there is no -- would be savaged by wiretaps and “ suspicion” that led the C IA to prosecution, there must be notice at by all the electronic marvels to surveil hundreds o f thousands o f least when the surveillance is ended. come. anti/Vietnam War activists in this Under the secret court, however, Yet the AC LU has never, so far as country while the FBI also kept tabs any number o f us may become like I know, taken the "strict construc on at least half a m illion dissenters Joseph K. — the pawn o f tionist” Brandeis approach on elec on the possibility that they might be mysterious, impenetrable forces. tronic surveillance. Instead, it has like ly to overthrow the gover One o f the reasons the secret kept trying to make wiretapping, et. nment.) court is unknown to much o f the al. conform to the Fourth Amend What makes this new assult on populance is that the American Civil ment -- as if that were possible. the Fourth Amendment particularly Liberties Union, which would o r Now, the secret court may well be intriguing is that, if the legislation dinarily have blown the whistle on getting expanded powers — to passes, agents will have to go to a this om inous governm ent en authorize warrants for dead-of-the- special court to get these secret croachment on privacy, agreed to night break-ins. The A C LU is w arrants. A nd, although most the setting up o f the court. It was strongly opposing this strengthening citizens don’t know it, this Kafka one o f those times, alas, when the o f the hidden court, but it has no lit like tribunal already exists and is AC LU decided to be "pragm atic.” tle responsibility for the fact that the functioning in a more restricted area It made a deal. In return for certain court already exists to be o f privacy invasion. “ safeguards” in the Foreign In broadened. Authorized by the Fofeign In- telligence Surveillance Act o f 1978, COPYRIGHT PNS 1980 The Morris Marks House 1501 SW Harrison Street Portland 97201 Telephone 227 2688 A nalysis DES CONNALL Professional Corporation LEGAL CLINIC CONCENTRATING IN THE FIELDS OF: CRIMINAL LAW INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS DRIVING UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF INTOXICANTS DOMESTIC RELATIONS WORKERS' COMPENSATION BANKRUPTCY PERSONAL INJURY WILLS - PROBATE AUTOMOBILE ACCIDENTS CONSUMER PROTECTION — If you have a problem that is not covered in this list, please call and ask whether we can help. 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