Americans may not like the fact that the National Security Agency has seized data on their phone and Internet usage, but feel like there is nothing they can

do about it. Constitutional law professor Randy Barnett (Georgetown University) believes Congress or the courts can put a stop to these data seizures. He

argues in a recent column that, “The NSA’s Surveillance is Unconstitutional.”
He also adds another concern to this invasion of our privacy. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (created by the Dodd-Frank financial reform) is

compiling a massive database of citizen’s personal information and financial transactions.
Randy Barnett says all of this violates some of the foundation principles of our government. The Fourth Amendment bans unreasonable seizures of a

person’s papers. It also protects what we today call “informational privacy.” The real question is whether seizing the records of private communications

companies is a violation of the Fourth Amendment. He argues that it does because of the way in which the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court routinely

approves the blanket seizure of every American’s metadata.
That raises a second constitutional question. The Fifth Amendment stipulates that no one may be deprived of property “without due process of law.” The

secret judicial proceedings, he believes, is the very “antithesis of the due process of law.” The secrecy of these meetings makes it impossible to hold public

servants accountable.
He also points to the future abuse of these records. Gun rights advocates oppose gun registration because gun registries would make it feasible for gun

confiscation to take place in the future. Likewise, these massive databanks make it feasible for government workers to download and use the private contents

of our electronic communication and financial transactions without our knowledge and consent.
Randy Barnett calls on Congress or the courts to put a stop to these unreasonable blanket seizures of data. I hope one of these bodies takes his advice.