WHEREAS S. 1959 (Collins, R-Maine), the “Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007” was introduced into the Senate on August 2, 2007, calling for (1) a short-term National Commission on the Prevention of Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism, and for other purposes, and (2) a long-term university-based Center of Excellence for the Study of Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism in the United States, and

WHEREAS S. 1959 is presently being considered in the US Senate.

WHEREAS a companion bill with the same name and provisions, HR 1955 (Harman, D-CA), passed the US House on Oct 23, 2007 by a 404 to 6 margin, and

WHEREAS these bills would allow participants in strikes, demonstrations, boycotts, and civil disobedience to be charged with homegrown terrorism, along with those who planned, promoted, and worked on such events, and

WHEREAS these bills move toward defining thought itself as legally subject to federal investigation and potentially punishable as violent, and

WHEREAS these bills direct government agencies to infiltrate and disrupt social justice advocacy organizations, in effect recreating the FBI’s COINTELPRO programs with new legal justification as well as  academic power and prestige, and

WHEREAS the Center’s power to infiltrate suspected organizations would allow the government to compile lists of homegrown terrorism suspects that could be kept secret and used years later, and

WHEREAS government infiltration, spying, interference, and disruption of social justice movements have a long history, and

WHEREAS government attempts to intimidate workers by declaring their strikes to be against national security occurred as recently as the Oakland dockworker’s strike in 2002, and

WHEREAS the bills' mandate to make Homeland Security and the Constitution compatible runs the risk of bending the Constitution to meet the needs of Homeland Security rather than the other way around, and

WHEREAS several national organizations have expressed concern about H.R. 1955/S. 1959, including the National Lawyers Guild, the Society of American Law Teachers, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, and

WHEREAS these laws are being deceptively packaged as progressive in both the House and Senate, with references to respecting the Constitution and civil liberties, not targeting particular races or ethnicities, and referring  to dangers of white supremacists, and by these means have gained support of many liberal legislators.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED THAT

_________________ declares itself opposed to the "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act(s) of 2007"

and resolves to notify its affiliated organizations of the dangers of these Acts and urge their opposition,

and resolves to publicize its opposition to S. 1959 to our Senators, where the bill is in its early stages of approval.

Supporting material on this petition.