I much appreciated Orin’s post criticizing the “Nearly Half in U.S. Say Restrict Muslims” reporting of a recent survey. As Orin pointed out, here’s what the survey actually measured, quoting this report:
1) Muslim civic and volunteer organizations should be infiltrated by undercover law enforcement agents to keep watch on their activities and fundraising.
2) U.S. government agencies should profile citizens as potential threats based on being Muslim or having Middle Eastern heritage.
3) Mosques should be closely monitored and surveilled by U.S. law enforcement agencies.
4) All Muslim Americans should be required to register their whereabouts with the federal government.
44% of respondents said yes to at least one of these questions.
To Orin’s criticisms, let me add this one: Options 1 through 3 say nothing about under what conditions these procedures are to happen. People can have lots of views on them. Consider, for instance, option 1. Some people might say that all Muslim organizations should be infiltrated. Others might say that most should be. Others might say that the government should infiltrate those that it has some reason to believe are being used as recruiting centers for jihadism (that’s my view). Still others might say that the government should never infiltrate any religious groups.
But the question lets people choose either “yes” or “no.” So the count of those who would “restrict[] . . . civil liberties of Muslim Americans” would include those who would infiltrate all Muslim organizations, as well as those who would simply reject the extreme opposite position that any religious or political organization must be immune from surveillance. (Plus, of course, it’s a judgment call whether one’s “civil liberties” include immunity from government infiltration of groups to which one belongs — there are arguments on both sides, but the Supreme Court has generally held that such infiltration doesn’t violate either the First Amendment or the Fourth Amendment.)
The hypothetical proposal in “All Muslim Americans should be required to register their whereabouts with the federal government” would be pretty clearly a restriction on civil liberties; I’d reject it myself, and I share Orin’s regret that it polled 29%. But it’s also the only option that specifies “all,” and that would clearly be unconstitutional.
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