Congress will be considering the sunsetting provisions of the USA Patriot Act later this year. In anticipation of the coming debate, the Standing Committee on Law and National Security of the American Bar Association has assembled a group of experts in this area to debate the merits of key sections of the Patriot Act (as well as other issues beyond the Patriot Act such as rules for detaining enemy combatants).
The essays are all going to be posted at www.patriotdebates.com, although only some of the essays have been posted at this time. They also will be assembled into a book available for purchase directly from the ABA. Stewart Baker, chair of the Standing Committtee, describes the goal of Patriot Debates as presenting “a series of ‘dueling essays’ on all of the most controversial issues relating to USA PATRIOT Act, written by some of the finest legal thinkers on these topics.” The list of participants includes Viet Dinh, Patricia Wald, John Yoo, David Cole, and a handful of others (including me). A bunch of the essays are already up on the current site, with more to come. My own essay on sections 209, 212, and 220 is available here.
The Top Secret Handbook For New Volokh Conspirators recommends writing a bunch of posts over the next few weeks urging you to buy the ABA book (see page 283, footnote 97 in the Handbook). But I don’t know why you would want to buy the book: all of the essays will be available online first at www.patriotdebates.com.
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