Press Release - For Immediate Release

For further information, contact: Chris Finan, American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, (212) 587-4025

NEW YORK, N.Y., June 25, 2002 -- The House Judiciary Committee wants to know how many subpoenas the Justice Department has issued to bookstores, libraries and newspapers under a controversial provision of the USA PATRIOT Act, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression reported today. The committee has also asked whether any safeguards have been adopted to prevent an abuse of the power to search these records, which was granted under Section 215 of the act. ABFFE President Chris Finan welcomed the Judiciary Committee inquiry. "Booksellers and libraries are worried that Section 215 will have a chilling effect on free speech," Finan said. "These are the questions that we have wanted to ask."

On June 13, Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), the ranking Democrat on the committee, sent Attorney General John D. Ashcroft a 12-page letter seeking details about the implementation of 50 provisions of the PATRIOT Act, including Section 215. The letter asks for written answers by July 9 and indicates that hearings will follow.

Although it does not criticize the PATRIOT Act directly, the Sensenbrenner/Conyers letter seems to suggest that the Justice Department should exercise restraint in seeking subpoenas for bookstore, library and newspaper records. Section 215 gives the government far more power to search bookstore, library and newspaper records than it has ever possessed. The FBI can request a court order in a secret hearing before a special "spy" court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), making it impossible for anyone to oppose the request on First Amendment grounds. In addition, the FBI does not need to show a compelling need for the information; it is sufficient to prove that it is relevant to an investigation.

Without recommending them, the letter identifies two potential safeguards: "requiring supervisory approval" before the records are sought or "requiring a determination that the information is essential to an investigation and could not be obtained through any other means." The letter is available here. (Bookstore, library and newspaper records are covered in Question 12.)

ABFFE, the bookseller's voice in the fight against censorship, believes that protecting the confidentiality of bookstore and library records is essential for the preservation of First Amendment rights: if people believe that law enforcement officials can gain easy access to their records, they lose the freedom to buy or borrow the books they want and need. Most recently, ABFFE supported Denver's Tattered Cover Book Store in its successful fight to prevent police from obtaining the records of one of its customers. In April, a unanimous Colorado Supreme Court cited the danger of a chilling effect in quashing a search warrant that had been issued to the Tattered Cover.