Perilous or Not, I Want My Rights
Here we are with another controversial American balancing act. How do we perfect the balance of national security with the maintenance of our civil liberties? Especially when the rights set forth in the Bill of Rights are nearly a sacrosanct ideal amongst the citizenry of this country. One way to insure a political and social backlash is to directly challenge -- and infringe upon -- the most sacred of our rights; yet, this has been the accepted policy of our government in times of crises and war, and the people have done little by way of objection to protest such actions.
As the reigns are tightened in times of war, we hear the propaganda machine spouting out time and time again things that sound like, "in this time of crisis, it is necessary -- for the protection of the people -- to withhold some of your rights, but it is only temporary." Temporary! Far too often, the word 'temporary' is acceptable to the people. The word 'temporary' carries with it, a sentiment of uncertainty and weakness. Temporary implies that our rights are malleable, pliable, permeable, loose, feeble, fragile, frail, but most importantly not permanent; and it is this ideal which runs at converse with what we've been taught about "Rights," in this country since our conception.
What is a "Right," if it's not permanent, and what is it worth if its construction and the belief in it is so loose. Forgive me if I have always thought rights were more then things simply set forth in some old piece of paper. It seems the American government sees "Rights" as merely the powers or privileges to which one is entitled when sanctioned by the government in set periods of time. But should not Rights, when woven together, represent something deeper; should they not constitute an ideal of moral propriety?
Should they not be values and freedoms to which we are justly entitled on a basic human level? Should they not be moral, social, cultural and governmental guarantees; isn't that what we preach? A Right isn't something that should be given and taken away at different times. It is not something that should even be able to be taken away. Not in a modern society, not in a moral society, not in a society that values human life, not in a country that preaches about its vast and glorious freedoms as represented by the Rights it flaunts to the rest of the worlds population. If our Rights aren't solid and permanent then what does that say to the other countries upon which we attempt to impose our freedoms and purported democratic superiority. "You should be free, just not all the time," I can hear a cryptic politician saying.
Times of war and crisis certainly qualify, to the government, as times when they can act more freely upon the American populous. They are times when dissent is seen as disloyalty says Geoffrey R. Stone in his book Perilous Times. Dissent is often one of the most powerful forms of free speech we possess as citizens of this country. It is something which we should, and have placed the greatest value upon, especially in times of crisis or war. But in these times, dissent is seen as disloyalty. Yet, as Stone says, "dissent that questions the conduct and morality of a war is, on this view, the very essence of responsible and courageous citizenship." It is the protection of this kind of speech in this kind of time which is at the base of a true and successful democracy.
But the government isn't and can't be solely to blamed, it is often mass sentiment of the populous that allows such infringements to happen. When wide spread fear sweeps the national in periods of crisis and war, people tend to revert to ideals of survival and give up rights they were guaranteed in the replacement for safety and protection. But what happened to those times when "the nation did not succumb to wartime hysteria" when "proposals fro the suppression of speech were rejected... because individuals in positions of authority understood them to bee unwise." (Stone, 532)
Weather it's the pentagon papers and the Vietnam War, or the sedition acts of 1798, whether it's temporary or not, the people should take a stand in the maintenance of their rights. Throughout the history of the United States, the priority in times of war have been on the war and not on the rights of the people. These are times when they feel well being of the nation supersedes the "freedom of speech." But it is the freedom of speech itself that, in a great way, maintains well being of our nation. When people fear speaking and voicing their opinions is when our nation has turned into something other then a democracy.
"It is easy," said Justice Robert Jackson, "by giving way to the passion, intolerance and suspicions of wartime, to reduce our liberties to a shadow, often in answer to exaggerate claims of security." The government claims that, in the name of the protection of the people, we will infringe upon your rights when necessary. But our Rights are protections in themselves, and if nothing else the freedom of speech is a protection against government for the people -- this is why we hold it as sacred. Yet time and time again the American people have let craze of wartime get the better of their senses.
Stone seems to end up reasoning that even though our rights are infringed upon during certain periods of time we usually value these rights more so afterward. We have "come increasing to celebrate and take pride in the nation's commitment to civil liberties... Americans have embraced an almost romantic vision of what makes this nation unique... the aspiration of Americans to be fair, tolerant of others, and respectful of constitutional liberties may be more deeply embedded in the American culture today that any time in the nations history." (Stone, 537) It is in this sense that is argument almost accepts the infringement upon our rights, and is something I can't agree with. If I have a right, I want it, now and forever more. It is but another imperfection in the American government.
War is most certainly a huge issue for any country. "Thousands, perhaps millions, of lives are at risk. The nation itself may be at peril. If ever there is a time to pull out all the stops, it is surely in wartime. In war, the government may conscript soldiers, commandeer property, control prices, ration food, raise taxes and freeze wages," says Stone. But they also abridge the freedom of speech and civil liberties. It was done in the civil war with Lincoln and the writ of Habeas Corpus, it was done in World War I, with the espionage act, the sedition act, in World War II and Japanese Interment; it was done with the cold war, with McCarthyism, and it was done in the Vietnam War and the Pentagon Papers.
Even if roughly 80% of our countries history is set in times of peace, times in which our Rights have stood firm in the face of government opposition, it is not reasonable to yield nor concede these rights at anytime, no matter what precedent has been set at certain times in our countries history. "To withstand the perils of war fever, a nation needs not only legal protection of civil liberties but a culture of civil liberties," says Stone, and given our history, in no place is that statement more relevant then the United States of America.