Learn how you can help ensure that the principle of due process endures this crisis
In Brief
The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states:
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
This cornerstone Constitutional principle applies to your smart phone and smart refrigerator as much as it applies to your home and car. And if the Constitution means what it says, it protects your "papers" from warrantless government surveillance as well--whether those "papers" are stored on your desk, left in your email inbox, or maintained as part of your online bank account. Our 4th Amendment work is wide-ranging--from traditional search and seizure issues to cutting edge technology and privacy concerns--and we also work to dramatically limit the warrantless surveillance of Americans under the guise of national security.
No warrants should issue without probable cause.
Our Constitution clearly bans warrantless searches. Instead, it requires the government to secure a warrant based on "probable cause" before it may search your home, your car, your papers, or your person. Probable cause has been defined as ....
Yet despite our Constitution's clear and unambiguous prohibition against warrantless searches, courts have spent decades creating well-intentioned but ever-increasing exceptions to this rule. As advocates for the Constitution, we believe that our modern society is perilously close to being subjected to warrantless surveillance on a near constant basis and we aim to reverse this dangerous trend.
We support:
--reform of the Electronic Communications Protection Act (ECPA), particularly the provision that allows government access to the content of emails stored online or on an internet server (as in a Gmail account) longer than 180 days without a warrant. [Support of Email Privacy Act or better]
--reform of laws that 1.) allow foreign governments the ability to obtain personal data stored in the US without a warrant; 2.) allow foreign governments to obtain real-time U.S. communications ("wiretaps") without satisfying the same legal safeguards that exist for wiretapping done by the US government; and 3.) allow US law enforcement to use information in criminal cases against US persons that was gathered by foreign governments by methods US law enforcement could not legally have gathered themselves.
--curtailing mass surveillance programs like: NSA's bulk call detail record collection of Americans under Section 215 of the Patriot Act
