Libraries are Dangerous Places

by LEN PARKER

Recently I had occasion to give a talk on the preservation of library archives; under the heading of “Establishing The Red Kiwi Library.”

During the latter part of my talk I listed but a tiny fraction of a vast record of the destruction of libraries throughout history. All nation states, without exception, sacked and burnt the archives and records of other nation states. I included periods in which books were simply banned for religious reasons, such as the Catholic Index of Prohibited Books (Index Librorum Prohibitorum,1600 - only abolished in 1966 by Pope Paul VI), or in order to destroy the cultural identity, accumulated knowledge and wisdom of the conquered.

More recently, I discovered another kind of assault on libraries; not so much on the books but on the library patrons themselves, while disabling their gate-keepers and guardians, the librarians. It is often said: Knowledge is power, while the lack of it by others serves to reinforce those who have access to it.

The discovery evoked the idea as to how a similar attack might impact on our civil liberties here in New Zealand, with the passing of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) Bill. This Bill aligns us with the United States NSL and PATRIOT Act and the Five Eye surveillance network in which we are enmeshed.

Similarly, the proposed Telecommunications (Interception Capability and Security) Bill, also before the House, will cohere with those of the United States. It enables, “the surveillance agencies (The New Zealand Police, the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service and the GCSB) to request information from network operators.”

While political debate and repartee in the parliamentary nowadays is increasingly abrasive and venomous, it is not exactly razor sharp or cutting edge. Labour and the Greens missed the opportunity to parry the sarcasm of Prime Minister John Key. In the debate on the GCSB Bill, being rushed through the House, Key referred to an opposition Labour member as Noddy. Some savvy wit might have responded with; “Our concern is with Big Ears” - referring of course to Tangimoana and Five Eyes international spy base network soon to spy on New Zealand citizens.

When Key sanctimoniously stated that “New Zealanders are more concerned with recreational fishing than the GCSB.” a quick riposte might have been; “Is fishing spelt with a Ph or an f?” But while there was lots of angry buzzing in the Beehive, the smoke from the government benches must have dulled the opposition's edge. Instead; the then leader of the Labour opposition, David Shearer, overcome by the two dead fish he brought into the house, immediately resigned.

Obviously, there is no Oscar Wilde amongst us!

To ensure the passing of this assault on our democratic freedom, civil liberties and the right to privacy, prime minister Key whipped his government members into line, depriving them of their right to a conscience vote, if one existed - which says a great deal about the opportunism of National MPs in ceding integrity and principle for Key's favour. Key then relied on the one vote of now independent Peter Dunne to carry the day, having already secured the support of “libertarian” ACT Party member John (cup-of-tea) Banks.

No courageous Marilyn Waring of the past - who brought down the Muldoon government by threatening to cross the floor - or even a dissenting Mike Monogue concerned with Muldoon's increasingly autocratic rule. Just a badger, lots of toadies, a rat or two and plenty of “Wind in the Willows”. (Perhaps a little unfair as Labour, the Greens and Mana promised, if they became the government, to repeal the Act.)

There is the mantra here in God's Own and elsewhere: “If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear.” I don't think that is what President Frankly D. Roosevelt meant when he said “There is nothing to fear but fear itself.” He took on the banks and corporate interests in the depression years of the nineteen thirties and introducing the Glass-Steagall Act to save capitalist America from itself..

MANA MP Hone Harawira was right in stating (at the public protest meeting in the Auckland Town Hall on the GCSB Bill) that the majority of poor beneficiaries, pensioners, low paid working class Maori, Pacific Islanders and Pakeha, if they were aware of the GCSB - and many were not – had neither energy or inclination to attend the meeting and would wonder what all the fuss was about. They were, he said, spied on all the time, by Social Welfare; IRD; police and many other departments of the State; as well as by their bosses; retail supermarkets; the banks and creditors and various others who ruled their lives.

Nevertheless: the assault on our civil rights and liberties is undeniable in this encroaching “Brave New World” of insidious surveillance and increasingly secret government with access to every detail of our personal lives as citizens - under the guise of National Security.

If you think you have nothing to fear from our willingness to prostrate ourselves before the United States, how about this?

In their book; “Standing Up to Madness”, Amy Goodman (Democracy Now host) and brother David Goodman relate how - during the Bush administration and under the United States PATRIOT Act - four librarians in Connecticut came under coercion from FBI agents wanting access to library subscribers' records and library computers, to determine who was reading and researching what - simply by presenting a letter under the Act from the NSL. No warrant required.

The FBI presented a letter from the NSL demanding the library make available: “... any and all subscriber information, billing information and access of any person or entity” that had used their computers across their twenty seven libraries between certain times on a certain date in 2005. While stunned by this “request” the executive director refused access believing it illegal under the Constitution.

“The letter advised that the information was sought 'to protect against international terrorism.'”

The agent pointed to a sentence in the letter that read that the recipients could not disclose “to any person that the FBI has sought or obtained access to information or records.” Effectively a perpetual gagging order. Information gained through an NSL is kept forever. A similar non-disclosure clause applies here in New Zealand under the the existing Security Intelligence (SIS) legislation.

However, the intrepid and defiant “mild-mannered” librarian did consult the three other library executives on this intrusion, who thought differently - believing, what people coming into the library did was their private affair and they should be able to use the library for whatever their want. The American Library Association (ALA) had a system protecting confidentiality: “that automatically erased any record of a patron's book use - provided the book was returned to the library and the fines paid”.

Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, however, allows the FBI agent to enter a library or bookstore and demand records of the books that patrons read and which internet sites they visited.

The nervous, but stoic, librarians took on the PATRIOT Act and engaged an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer to represent them in their law suit and sought an injunction against having to comply with the NSL; requesting a ruling to strike down NSLs as unconstitutional. They also wanted the gag order lifted so that they could inform their full board of directors about what was happening.

Former U.S. attorney general John Ashcroft accused the defiant librarians of creating “baseless hysteria.” Sound familiar?

Although the four librarians were the only ones who could testify in court that the FBI was using the NSL and PATRIOT Act against libraries, they couldn't speak or identify themselves to the public in any way.

In the first of the so-called “Connecticut Library Connection” hearings, John Doe v Gonzales, in federal court the John Doe librarians were excluded and only able to observe the proceedings by closed-circuit television inside a locked storage room in the Hartford courthouse.

Other librarians, having got wind of the case, came from all around the region to fill the court without knowing who the librarians in the case were.

When their cover was eventually blown - after a judge's ruling - due to government bungling when they were forced to release some documents in which they failed to redact references to the Library Connection and the name of one of the principals was exposed. The ACLU lawyer informed the named person that it was so serious that they (ACLU) had decided to hire criminal attorneys - just in case.

Nevertheless the gag order remained. Even when John Doe Connecticut went to an appeals court in October 2005 in Manhattan, New York, the four librarians had to conceal their reason for attending,

as well as their identity, and could not sit together, look at, or acknowledge each other or their attorney. Once again librarians came from regions all over the United States in unity.

In Washington, DC, librarians protested in support of their unnamed Connecticut colleagues by wearing gags emblazoned with NSL.

The authors note that government's insistence on keeping the librarians gagged became Orwellian and worthy of Kafka. The district court in Bridgeport ruled that the gag order violated the librarians' first amendment rights and that there was no compelling reason why revealing the names of the four would hinder the government's investigation. In fact it had become a hindrance.

After statements before the congress and much debate, the many loyal hand-on-heart patriotic “representatives of the people”- sworn to uphold the constitution of the United States, but apparently more concerned about the up-coming election (while wishing to get these hornets out of their hair) - assembled to reauthorize the Act.

The PATRIOT Act was reauthorized in 2006, and incorporated a clause that the FBI had to show ”reasonable grounds” to demand library information - a pathetically low threshold, according to the authors.

Following the reauthorization, part of the John Doe Connecticut's case - the challenge to the NSL provision of the PATRIOT Act - was ruled moot, since the law had changed. But the gag order remained.

Six weeks after the PATRIOT Act was reauthorized, the Justice Department had a sudden change of heart .The librarians were no longer a threat to national security after all. The government informed the ACLU that they would no longer contest librarians' demand to lift the gag order.

“That is how the four of us became the only Americans who can speak about our experience “ Peter Chase, one of the four and director of the Plainville Public Library in central Connecticut, said.

When asked by the Goodmans, “which book in their libraries best captured their experience, the librarians unhesitatingly mentioned Orwell's Nineteen Eighty Four”.

So is there a lesson here for us?

Well apparently not. We have little to worry about if we have no secrets and have done nothing wrong, because the spy masters have to get a warrant from prime minister Key who has over-sight, chairs the GSCB, and is so concerned with our liberties that he will not issue them lightly. So we can safely go fishing without worrying about the spooks breaking into our houses, monitoring our emails and computers, checking with our neighbours or visiting our local library.

No wonder beneficiaries – who know about these things - think it is simply a storm in a tea cup – or was that a cup of tea - and only “conniving” journalists who eves-drop on important “other” people and violate their privacy face prosecution? Enigmatically, although the police here found “our own” Dotcom was a victim of an illegal invasion and violation of his person and property by the state, no further action will be taken.

I suggest readers get a copy of the Goodman's' small book “Standing Up to Madness” as there is much more to this episode. It also includes chapters on the “Pentagon Papers” and “Science Under Siege”, on climate change denial and the censorship and gagging of James Hansen the director of NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies; the renowned climate scientist who recently visited New Zealand, to tell us about something that isn't happening apparently. At least, according to our oilwellian masters.