Ashcroft: First Amendment Terminator

Is there no end to what Attorney General John Ashcroft will do to destroy the Bill of Rights?  In a blatant affront to First Amendment rights of free speech and association, and in an action designed to warn and chill dissenters of any government position, Ashcroft's brown boots are prosecuting some Greenpeace protestors under an old maritime law.

As reported in The New York Times, in April of 2002, two Greenpeace activists climbed aboard a cargo ship from their inflatable raft, three miles off the Florida. to protest the ship's cargo of mahogany.  They were "detained" by the Coast Guard, spent the weekend in custody and were sentenced to time served for "boarding without permission." 

Now, 15 months later, federal prosecutors have indicted Greenpeace itself  "authorizing" the boarding. Though Greenpeace, the organization, cannot spend time in prison, the feds, including the Treasury Department and the IRS, can make life hell for the entity and its members.

The group is charged with violating an obscure 1872 law intended for proprietors of boarding houses who preyed on sailors returning to port. It forbids the unauthorized boarding of "any vessel about to arrive at the place of her destination." The last court decision concerning the law, from 1890, said it was meant to prevent "sailor-mongers" from luring crews to boarding houses "by the help of intoxicants and the use of other means, often savoring of violence."

Brushing aside the protests of First Amendment experts and the organization's lawyers, the prosecutor said that Greenpeace exists as an organization solely to engage in unlawful activity.  Say what? Oh, I get it. Next the organization and its members will be charged as terrorists under the PATRIOT and Homeland Security Acts for interfering with a sailing vessel in order to make a political statement. And be on the list of terrorist organizations. And you know what that means? If not, check out the PATRIOT Act.