NYT: O'Connor Foresees Limits on Freedom

[Incognito Innominatus]

O'Connor Foresees Limits on Freedom

By LINDA GREENHOUSE

Describing herself as "still tearful" after viewing the World Trade Center
site, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor told a law school audience in Manhattan yesterday
that as part of the country's response to terrorism, "we're likely to experience
more restrictions on our personal freedom than has ever been the case in our
country."

Lawyers have a special duty to work to maintain the rule of law in the face
of terrorism, Justice O'Connor said, adding in a quotation from Margaret Thatcher,
the former British prime minister: "Where law ends, tyranny begins."

Justice O'Connor, who was on an official visit to India when the terrorist
attacks took place on Sept. 11, was the first Supreme Court justice to speak
publicly about the events and their possible legal consequences. She was the
main speaker at the groundbreaking for a law school building at New York University
in Greenwich Village.

Her brief remarks emphasized the need to proceed with care in the aftermath
of a national trauma that she said "will cause us to re-examine some of our
laws pertaining to criminal surveillance, wiretapping, immigration and so on."

Lawyers would play an important role in striking the right balance, she said,
adding, "Lawyers and academics will help define how to maintain a fair and
a just society with a strong rule of law at a time when many are more concerned
with safety and a measure of vengeance."

Justice O'Connor did not offer an analysis of any particular proposal, instead
observing that "no single response is appropriate for every situation."

Referring to the prospect that military deployments overseas rather than domestic
prosecutions will be a principal means of bringing terrorists to justice, she
said: "It is possible, if not likely, that we will rely more on international
rules of war than on our cherished constitutional standards for criminal prosecutions
in responding to threats to our national security."

Justice O'Connor posed a series of questions at the ceremony:

"First, can a society that prides itself on equality before the law treat terrorists
differently than ordinary criminals? And where do we draw the line between
them? Second, at what point does the cost to civil liberties from legislation
designed to prevent terrorism outweigh the added security that that legislation
provides?"

Without answering the questions herself, she concluded: "These are tough questions,
and they're going to require a great deal of study, goodwill and expertise
to resolve them. And in the years to come, it will become clear that the need
for lawyers does not diminish in times of crisis; it only increases."

Justice O'Connor, who grew up in Arizona, said her visit to New York and the
trade center site had changed her image of a city she and her husband, John,
had considered "harsh, brash, brassy, tough."

Now, she said, "there is a new spirit here and it's one of warmth, solidarity,
humanity and determination that we have not witnessed before."

She added: "It's very noticeable and very moving."