National Security vs. Civil Liberties Essay

The new-fashioned folk 11th attacks have caused many Americans to wonder more or less the individualized sacrifices to be made in order to keep the nation practiced and free. With mixed results, it has vex a common practice throughout narration to restrict personal freedoms in the figure of national security. Many questions sneak from this process Where is the line drawn? If liberties are restricted do they always truly return? If it is true that we are doomed to repeat story if we fail to learn from it, an examination into the circumstances of the Japanese American incarceration in 1942 may inform the ways to most effectively push-down list with the security concerns faced by Americans today.There is a paradox in American theories of democracy and freedom. As the United States has fought abroad in the name of freedom, we have simultaneously restricted the personal freedoms of people in the country. When chairwoman Franklin D. Roosevelt engaged in battle in World War II, it was non only to retaliate against the Japanese attack on Pearl prevail but to bring down the Nazi regime that was murdering people in Europe. At the same time, Roosevelt had nearly 120,000 Japanese Americans, the majority of whom were American citizens or legal permanent residents, rounded up into internment camps, violating their civil rights to be treated with fairness and equality, without discrimination and the Fifth Amendment liberty of due process.In 2001, people are quick to dismiss the idea of an internment of American citizens, suggesting that the country has come a long way from 1942. The hypothesis that the administration might conduct surveillance or use illegal wiretaps to superintend groups or individuals that it suspects of domestic terrorism seemed foreign before September 11th, and now has become a way to gain more information about potential suspects. These new measures, included in the USA Patriot Act, delicately trace the line between national security an d civil liberties. A brief look at how the Bush administration has extended its powers since September 11th includes the detaining without charge of thousands of Muslim and Arab-American men without release of information to family nor legal access, a new Bureau of Prisons regulation which allows Justice discussion section officials to listen in on conversationsbetween suspects and their lawyers and a new legislation, which includes warrant-less searches, roving wiretaps and a redefinition of a domestic terrorist. American society is not merely comfortably distanced from the practices of history that have threatened the civil rights and liberties Americans enjoy. Fred Korematsus discourse engagements continued in 2001, as he warned college students to stay aware of what the political relation is doing, and to stand prepared to defend their freedoms.In times of crisis, as presidential power expands, domestic policies must take shape to ensure the surety of Americans, from forei gn and domestic threats. The Bush administration has a difficult toil ahead, to keep Americans safe while maintaining the freedom which makes this country great. The delicate case of interviewing Arab Americans has presented a challenge and continues the debate among Americans about how many of our civil liberties become expendable when the country is at war.