The following excerpts are from a panel presentation, "Civil Rights After 9/11", held at the 2002 Socialist Scholars Conference in New York City on April 14, 2002. The panel participants were long-time National Lawyers Guild members moderator Michael Steven Smith, Len Weinglass, Abdeen Jabara, Michael Ratner and Lynne Stewart, and were joined by Clark Kissinger from Refuse&Resist! in a discussion of the current attacks on civil liberties and human rights.
Click on each panelist's name to get a sampling of what they said.
Michael Steven Smith: Moderator
Michael was counsel to the G.I. Civil Liberties Committee during the Vietnam war. He has written Notebook of a Sixties Lawyer, Lawyers You'll Like, and is co-editor with Michael Ratner and Karin Kunstler Goldman of the forthcoming book by William M. Kunstler, entitled Great American Political Trials. He practices personal injury law in New York City.
Clark Kissinger: Analysis and context of USA PATRIOT Act
As National Secretary of Students for a Democratic Society, Clark organized the first March on Washington against the war on Vietnam in 1965. Today Clark is a contributing writer for the Revolutionary Worker and a member of the Executive Committee of Refuse & Resist!
Len Weinglass: Changes in government's authority to conduct surveillance
Leonard is a criminal defense attorney whose clients have included the Chicago 7 and Mumia Abu-Jamal. He was an attorney in the Pentagon Papers case and is a long-time member of the National Lawyers Guild.
Abdeen Jabara: Attacks on immigrants and persons without nationality
Abdeen is former president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. During the mid-1970s and 1980s he was instrumental in exposing the Nixon administration's "Operation Boulder" program against Arabs and Arab-Americans, which included deportations, surveillance and harassment campaigns. He practices civil rights law in New York City.
Michael Ratner: Unfettered executive discretion and violations of international law
Michael is President of the Center for Constitutional Rights and past President of the National Lawyers Guild. He is a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School where he teaches international human rights litigation and has co-authored three books on international human rights issues.
Lynne Stewart: Indicted attorney
Lynne Stewart was added to the panel when Attorney General John Ashcroft chose her as the first target in the Justice Department's assault on the attorney-client privilege and its campaign of intimidation directed at lawyers who represent political or unpopular defendants.
