The Patriot Act

The Patriot Act

Extremism in the defense of either security or liberty in not a virtue. On September 11th, 2001 events occurred on the east coast of the United States that shook the foundation of America and the freedom it stands for to its core. The terrorist attacks not only killed thousands of innocent people of many different nationalities and races, it also changed the way that Americans thought. The tragedies shocked and terrified the citizens of this great country, to a point that when Congress passed the Patriot Act citizens did not pay much attention. The Patriot Act and the Homeland Security Act have paved the way for the government to be involved in citizen's lives more than at any point in American history. The power that the government gave to itself is immense and extremely intrusive to personal freedoms of average American citizens.

Much has been made of the Homeland Security Act which created its own Presidential Cabinet-level department, a "federal agency whose primary mission is to help prevent, protect against, and respond to acts of terrorism on United States soil." (whitehouse.gov) The office of Homeland Security with the blanket of the US Patriot Act are able to disrupt the privileges of Americans "for the safety of America" with shockingly little supervision from any other branch of the government. When the Patriot Act and the Homeland Security act were passed, one month after September 11th, citizens were not aware of much of the fine print which let the government by the way of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) invade their lives.

The DHS was set up in the wake of September 11th, 2001 in response to the vulnerability of America to terrorist attacks. Its aim was to coordinate the numerous agencies that protect America and to respond to attacks, natural disasters, and other emergencies which occur across the nation. To do this the DHS has brought many previously separate agencies under one roof, including; the U.S. Customs Service, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Transportation Security Administration, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), National Domestic Preparedness Office, and the Energy Security and Assurance Program. These agencies with significant contributions from the FBI and CIA are part of the umbrella that was set up to prevent terrorists from hurting America. Although the aim of the DHS