Amateur Hour?

The Honorable Anna Diggs-Taylor probably means well. The lone judge in American history to order a president to halt in wartime a foreign-intelligence-collection program that has undoubtedly saved lives probably sympathizes with the journalists, and others, who are suing to stop the Terrorist Surveillance Program (TSP) in which NSA intercepts foreign-U.S. terrorist communications. She probably feels in her heart the program is wrong, and undoubtedly hears the footsteps of the federal judicial panel moving towards taking this case away from her and consolidating it with others.

We can sympathize with her motives, and even share some of her gut feelings of uneasiness about the program. But we cannot accept the stunningly amateurish piece of, I hesitate even to call it legal work, by which she purports to make our government go deaf and dumb to those would murder us en masse. Her bosses on the Court of Appeals and/or the United States Supreme Court will not accept it.

Much will be said about this opinion in the coming days. I’ll start with this: I wouldn’t accept this utterly unsupported, constitutionally and logically bankrupt collection of musings from a first-year law student, much less a new lawyer at my firm. Why not? Herewith, a start at a very long list of what’s wrong with Judge Taylor’s opinion.

Process Fouls. When you sue your plumber over a disputed $50 invoice, before deciding who wins, the judge is required to jump through some minor constitutional hoops like actually hearing evidence (as opposed to press reports), holding hearings, and reading and understanding the briefs filed and the laws at issue. Judge Taylor appears to have taken none of these rudimentary steps before issuing one of the most sweeping wartime legal rulings in our nation’s history. Experts on both sides agree it is impossible to decide the crucial Fourth and First Amendment issues in this case without detailed, factual knowledge of precisely what the government is doing (see, e.g., the brief I filed with the Washington Legal Foundation, at www.morgancunningham.net, and the excellent testimony of David Kris, at http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2006_hr/index.html). Judge Taylor apparently needs no more facts than what she reads in the papers.

Worse, the judge clearly failed to do enough homework to understand the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act itself, much less the Fourth Amendment. She gets basic provisions of the statute itself wrong, e.g., apparently believing that a provision explicitly dealing with foreign agent/non-U.S. persons communications constitutes an “exception” to FISA’s warrant requirements. She also seems to make the elementary and fatal mistake made by many commentators, that the government can, under FISA, listen in on conversations for 72 hours without meeting FISA’s substantive and procedural tests. This is simply false. NSA cannot lawfully, under FISA, listen to a single syllable of a covered communication until it can prove to the Attorney General (usually in writing) that it can jump through each and every one of FISA’s procedural and substantive hoops. These basic errors could have been corrected had the court bothered to gather any evidence or hold substantive hearings.

More worrisome still are the judge’s breathtaking mistakes in analyzing the Fourth and First Amendments—errors that would earn our first-year law student an “F.” Here’s one of several examples: The judge asserts that the Fourth Amendment, in all cases, “requires prior warrants for any reasonable search, based upon prior-existing probable cause.” She cites no legal authority whatsoever for this colossal misstatement of the law, because none exists. Instead, there are numerous situations where our courts have found no prior warrant is required, so long as a search is “reasonable.” Fatal to her position is the very Supreme Court case she herself cites. This landmark 1972 electronic-surveillance decision, the Keith case, makes clear that, though it establishes a warrant requirement for purely domestic security cases (decidedly not what the TSP is, raising the alarming possibility the judge may think the TSP is a “domestic” program), the Fourth Amendment does not always require a prior warrant for government searches. Rather, the need for warrants depends on a balancing of the government’s legitimate needs, such as protecting us from attack, against other constitutional interests.

Lest there be any doubt as to whether Keith supported Judge Taylor’s view about the warrant requirement for communications with overseas terrorist groups, the Keith court stated that “the instant case requires no judgment on the scope of the President’s surveillance power with respect to the activities of foreign powers, within or without this country.”

While Keith at least left open the question, a post-FISA case, also cited by Judge Taylor herself (In re Falvey), could not have more clearly dispensed with her claimed warrant requirement: “When, therefore, the President has, as his primary purpose, the accumulation of foreign intelligence information, his exercise of Article II power to conduct foreign affairs is not constitutionally hamstrung by the need to obtain prior judicial approval before engaging in wiretapping.”

Apparently Judge Taylor failed to read that portion of the Falvey opinion. She makes similarly striking mistakes on the issues of standing and separation-of-powers. Which brings us to the heart of the problem with the judge’s missive.

Ignoring Contrary Authority. Under legal-ethics rules, deliberately failing to call to a court’s attention legal authority contrary to one’s position is grounds for disciplinary action. In addition to the above, here are several more examples of this unpardonable legal sin in Judge Taylor’s opinion.

Appeals Court Cherry-Picking. The judge relies heavily on the D. C. Circuit Court of Appeals plurality (less than majority) opinion in Zweibon v. Mitchell. That case suggests in dicta (language not necessary to decide the case, and, therefore, of no precedential value) that all electronic surveillance, even for foreign intelligence involving an overseas connection, may require prior warrants. Judge Taylor fails to mention, however, that, while Zweibon didn’t actually reach this question, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review (the appellate court set up explicitly to have the foreign-intelligence and national-security expertise Judge Taylor clearly lacks) did. Here’s what it said (in 2002): “[A]ll . . . courts to have decided the issue, held the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information.’

Utterly ignoring this 2002 FISA Court of Review opinion, as well as the numerous 1970s-’80s federal appeals and district court decisions directly opposed to her position, Judge Taylor offers instead an extended discussion of a 1765 case from England.

Selective Reading Redux. The judge discusses at length Justice Jackson’s concurring opinion in Youngstown Sheet and Tube, without bothering to mention:

—that Justice Jackson himself, in that very opinion, disavowed the application of the opinion beyond that case’s primarily domestic context (seizure of U.S. steel mills in the face of a union strike);

—that our courts long after Youngstown emphasized its limitations to primarily domestic cases and that other legal authorities more appropriately govern primarily foreign-affairs/foreign-intelligence-collection cases, such as the TSP; or

—most importantly, the entire line of Supreme Court and other decisions, most famously including Curtiss-Wright Export, cited many times since Youngstown, making clear the president’s constitutional primacy in foreign-affairs/foreign-intelligence collection, upon which neither Congress nor the courts may intrude.

Lawyers and judges are free to argue that contrary authority does not control a particular decision. They are not free ethically to disregard the vast majority of cases rejecting their position, selectively citing the single case arguably supporting them.

Trivial Pursuit. Perhaps most disturbing about the judge’s opinion is the trivial way it treats the Fourth and First Amendments to our Constitution. In landmark cases balancing wartime needs with cherished principles in the Bill of Rights, our great judges and justices have painstakingly analyzed all applicable authority, soberly balancing our crucial national interests and values. Judge Taylor spends a total of three double-spaced pages addressing the Fourth Amendment and little more than two addressing the First Amendment. Her reasoning, to the extent one can follow it, is little more than one would find in watching a surreal “Schoolhouse Rock” episode. The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches. All searches without warrants are unreasonable (which, as noted above, is flatly wrong). Therefore, with no case support cited, Judge Taylor finds the TSP unconstitutional. The First Amendment protects free speech, which, defying the dictionary meaning of the word, she asserts the TSP “regulates.” FISA prohibits targeting persons for surveillance solely for activities protected by the First Amendment (FISA, of course, being a statute, not a constitutional provision, and the administration having stated publicly they do not target individuals on that basis). Therefore, says Her Honor, the TSP is unconstitutional.

Such trivial (if not incomprehensible) legal analysis would be unacceptable in our $50 plumbing-bill case. Using it to justify shutting down a program protecting us from terrorist attack in war is tantamount to an abrogation of the judge’s oath to support and defend the Constitution. Though unlikely based on what has been publicly reported, it is possible that a court armed with all the facts could conclude that the TSP runs afoul of the First or Fourth Amendments. It is not possible to decide that based on press reports and platitudes.

Amateur hour? Judge Taylor, a law professor, has been on the bench since 1979. She is decidedly not an amateur. So, how to explain her first-year failing-grade opinion? Regrettably, the only plausible explanation is that she wanted the result she wanted and was willing to ignore and misread vast portions of constitutional law to get there, gambling the lives and security of her fellow Americans in the bargain.

Whatever Judge Taylor’s motives, it is critical to understand the impact of her decision, were it allowed to stand. Among many damaging results, the Terrorist Surveillance Program, publicly credited not 72 hours ago with helping to prevent the “9/11 Part 2” British airline bombings, will be shut down and our enemies will know it. Worse, neither politically accountable branch of government (even working together) would be able to modify FISA in a way that did not require prior judicial warrants based on probable cause and particularity as to the person targeted. In other words, there would be no lawful way, short of amending the Constitution, to ever collect catastrophic-terrorist-attack warning information unless we knew in advance it was coming, and the identities of the precise individuals who were going to communicate it.

As Judge Taylor’s new favorite justice, Robert Jackson himself, warned, the courts should not “convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact.” I will put my daughters to bed tonight confident that the Court of Appeals and our Supreme Court will not allow Judge Taylor’s giant step in that direction to stand.

— Bryan Cunningham served in senior positions in the CIA and as a federal prosecutor under President Clinton, and as deputy legal adviser to the National Security Council under President George W. Bush. He is a private information security and privacy lawyer at Morgan & Cunningham LLC in Denver, Colorado, and a member of the Markle Foundation Task Force on National Security in the Information Age. Along with the Washington Legal Foundation, he filed an amicus brief in this case, and has testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the Terrorist Surveillance Program.

"Golly, that sounds a lot like Affirmative Action doesn't it?"

RUSH: A federal judge ruled just moments ago that the government's warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered an immediate halt to it. "US district Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, in Detroit, became the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's program, which she says violates the rights of free speech and privacy." Who is this babe? Who is Judge Anna Diggs Taylor? By the way, you see what's happening, ladies and gentlemen, the judiciary, which I and others have been warning you, is out of control, is now assuming commander-in-chief duties. Some federal judge, Eastern District of Michigan, decides to take it on her shoulders. She campaigned for Jimmy Carter. He appointed her to the federal bench in 1979.

She is a Carter appointee. It all makes sense. The first African-American woman appointed to a federal judgeship in Michigan, appointed in 1979, November 15th, sworn in as a federal judge to the US District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, 1997. She became the first African-American woman to be named chief judge of the eastern district of the United States district court. She stepped down in 1988 as chief judge in order to reduce her work load, continued to serve as a senior federal judge. But that's not all, ladies and gentlemen. The Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, June 18th, 2002, a column by Thomas J. Bray entitled: "Disorder in the Court -- Judicial shenanigans mar an affirmative-action case. Will Congress investigate?

"Rumors in Washington has it that the House Judiciary Committee may hold hearings into the events surrounding the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' 5-4 decision upholding the University of Michigan Law School's affirmative action program. In a rare break with judicial comity, two judges in the court publicly questioned the procedures that Chief Judge Boyce Martin, a Carter appointee, had set out in the case... Chief Judge Anna Diggs Taylor of the federal District Court in Detroit tried to take the suit against the law school away from Judge Bernard Freedman, who had been assigned it through a blind draw," which is the standard way these things happen. Case goes to a court, whoever is up next on the docket gets the case.

This babe, Chief Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, Carter appointee, tried to take this case away from the judge, Bernard Freedman, "who had been assigned it through a blind draw and who was suspected of being skeptical about affirmative action." The judge who was assigned the case was suspected of being skeptical about affirmative action. He was suspected! So this Stalinist judge, Anna Diggs Taylor, said, "Well, we can't have somebody that's biased that way. We need somebody like me, biased my way, toward affirmative action. That's what's fair in my courtroom." At any rate, she wanted to "consolidate it with a similar suit against the university's undergraduate admissions practice, which Judge Patrick Duggan was hearing. The chief judge dropped that effort was dropped after the judge hearing the law school complaint went public with a blistering opinion objecting to what he termed 'the highly irregular' effort of the chief judge," which would be Anna Diggs Taylor.

That is a break with tradition. Normally what goes on behind closed doors and courts is never known. But she was trying to take the case away, because she suspected the judge who had been assigned the case was dubious of affirmative action. Can't have that. Just civil liberties, civil rights advocate, not a judge. She's just a satellite member of the ACLU that's sitting as a judge, for all intents and purposes. How did this case get tried before her court anyway? Did the ACLU say we want to try this case -- they had to know that they were going to a sympathetic judge. Why in the world would you choose a court in the Eastern District of Michigan to file suit against the federal government and the NSA program? The only reason to do it is if you know you've got somebody in your own club on the bench.

Thank you, Jimmy Carter, you doofus. Glittering jewel of colossal ignorance, worst president in my lifetime and in the modern era, an utter disaster. More on him in just a moment. "Judge Duggan ruled in favor of the undergraduate racial preferences, while Judge Freedman ruled against the law school preferences." So that's who this babe is, ladies and gentlemen, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor -- I don't know if there were ever -- I guess there weren't congressional hearings on what went on. Of course not. What year was it, two thousand -- of course Republicans investigate Democrats? Hell, who's kidding who? Wouldn't do anything like this.

Read the Background Material...

(AP: Judge nixes warrantless surveillance)
(WSJ: Disorder in the Court - 06.12.02)

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081706/content/limbaugh_legal_division.guest.html

"Whatever Judge Taylor’s motives, it is critical to understand the impact of her decision, were it allowed to stand. Among many damaging results, the Terrorist Surveillance Program, publicly credited not 72 hours ago with helping to prevent the “9/11 Part 2” British airline bombings, will be shut down and our enemies will know it."

Or will they? When this idiotic leak came forward from the idiotic news media, predominantly liberal, to try to harm the administration's efforts to get the job done and delaying successes by destroying a working program for political means, couldn't this be an excellent way to fool the murdering animals into going back to using the same means thinking it is safe? Or maybe it isn't? Since the media screwed it up like a bunch of morons, couldn't they be moron enough to report the opposite for the administration in their exuberance and offer the administration to use the program during court procedings with greater successes of use or non-use by the enemy?

The media shouldn't be fed more than twice a day. They convert the means to dishonesty and stupidity, at best.

Red

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