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The Problems With This FISA Bill
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The July 3 editorial "FISA Follies" FISA stated:
"The telecommunications companies complied with a government request after being assured, in writing, that the activities had been authorized by the president and deemed lawful by the attorney general. Punishing them by forcing them to endure the cost and hassle of lawsuits would be counterproductive to securing such cooperation in the future, while offering little prospect of a useful outcome."
However, as University of Houston law professor Jordan J. Paust has noted, the 1852 Supreme Court decision Mitchell v. Harmony affirmed that superior orders are not a defense: "[an] order to do an illegal act . . . can afford no justification." And in 1912, a Texas District Court affirmed, in Ex parte Orozco, that conduct resting "merely upon an order directed by the President" was illegal and cannot "be sustained in a court of justice."
In fact, at least one telecommunications company, Qwest, knew that the order was illegal and refused to comply.
The compliant telephone companies may have colluded in the violation of the Fourth Amendment. Let them defend themselves in open court so that the truth is known. Surely they expend legal resources on far more trivial matters.
JIM CASSEDY
Hyattsville
