#Snowden: Last Word For Today, and It's For You, DU...

[JDPriestly]

83. The program is a violation of the Constitution which is the highest

law of the land.

This massive collection of a database chills many of our rights including our First Amendment rights. It also chills our right to counsel and our right to confront the witnesses against us in a criminal trial among other things.

U.S. Constitution


Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/first_amendment

If they know they are under surveillance, people will watch what they say, the press will watch who they talk to and what they print, and people will not have the freedom of association to exercise their right to "peaceably . . . assemble."

That this procedure chills our basic rights is a violation of the Constitution.