AFT Calls for Reforming USA Patriot Act
National Union to Compile a Record of Civil Rights Violations
on Campuses and at Medical Facilities, Libraries and Other Workplaces

Washington, D.C. — The American Federation of Teachers at its biennial convention passed a resolution calling for major changes in the USA Patriot Act, contending that "there is no inherent conflict between the national security and the preservation of liberty; Americans can be both safe and free."

The 3,000 delegates to the AFT national convention called on the Bush administration and Congress to reinterpret the way the law is implemented and urge Congress to hold open hearings before renewing the Patriot Act.

The resolution calls into question the Bush administration’s use of the Patriot Act to detain citizens and resident noncitizens at undisclosed locations without charges, deny access to legal counsel or notification to the detainees’ families. The union resolution also questions the use of electronic surveillance in criminal and anti-terrorist investigations free of oversight by federal courts.

The AFT singles out for special "outrage" the administration’s use of the USA Patriot Act and Department of Homeland Security regulations to deprive federal workers of the right to join a union. The AFT calls such use "counterproductive and incredibly cynical."

The AFT resolution also states its concern that law enforcement and intelligence agencies have been empowered to review personal medical, financial, library and education records at both the K-12 and higher education levels with almost no judicial oversight.

The Patriot Act was signed into law Oct. 26, 2001, with limited congressional review or public comment. The AFT resolution, which becomes AFT policy, calls on the union to compile data from affiliates on instances of violations of civil rights on campuses and at medical facilities, libraries and other workplaces where AFT represents workers. Such reports will be reported to the AFT executive council on a regular basis. The AFT also will launch a vigorous lobbying campaign in support of civil liberties.

The union resolution calls for greater access to the courts by detainees, more privacy protections for all Americans and resident noncitizens, and limits on secret sources. The AFT also calls for expanded surveillance to be limited to suspected terrorists rather than to ordinary crimes.

AFT’s long history of speaking out against civil rights abuses at home and abroad includes raising funds in the 1930s to help finance the defense of the "Scottsboro Boys," filing an amicus brief in the Brown v Board of Education Supreme Court case, and extensive involvement in the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and other civil rights efforts in the ‘60s. More recently the AFT has spoken out in defense of teachers unfairly jailed in other nations, and has assisted free trade unions in South Africa in their struggle to end apartheid, as well as Poland’s Solidarity and other labor movements in Eastern European nations, which led the effort to end decades of repressive communist regimes.

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