Bush executive order threatens Fifth Amendment

An executive order recently promulgated by President Bush announces sweeping new powers to confiscate property of anybody coming close to helping insurgents in Iraq:

Under Bush's executive order, the U.S. government has endowed itself with the authority to freeze the American assets of anyone who directly or indirectly assists someone who poses "a significant risk" of committing a violent act that has the purpose or effect of threatening the Iraqi government, the "peace and stability" of the country or the reconstruction effort.

The White House has claimed the order is targeted at people or groups that are helping the insurgents, particularly in Syria or Iran, but the language of the order is far broader than its stated intent.

The order's liberal use of the word "or" and inclusion of the highly subjective term "significant risk" are particularly troubling in the hands of a White House that has suggested that domestic war critics are emboldening U.S. enemies in Iraq.

Bruce Fein and others are troubled by the dragnet language:

“On its face, this is the greatest encroachment on civil liberties since the internment of Japanese Americans in World War II,” said Bruce Fein, a constitutional lawyer who was a deputy attorney general in the Reagan administration and author of an article of impeachment against President Bill Clinton. …

Fein, who was in San Francisco last week, said latest executive order on Iraq continues a Bush administration pattern of “sneering contempt for the Constitution“ that is unmatched in U.S. history. “These precedents, if unchallenged, lie around like loaded weapons,“ Fein said. He reminds his fellow conservatives that Republicans will not occupy the White House forever. …

The targets of the property seizures, even American citizens, would not be given any advance notice or opportunity to challenge the government's action in court. The American Civil Liberties Union has noted that an order this sweeping could encompass “entirely innocent” activities such as an donations to humanitarian relief groups that indirectly provide what the U.S. government decides is “material support” to supporters of the insurgency.

“This order could have a serious chilling effect on charitable contributions intended to ease the suffering in Iraq,“ said Michael German, ACLU national security counsel.

I see it as going even broader. Could it be used to target antiwar protestors? That “significant risk” phrase could be awfully elastic.