Hope this isn’t a dupe — an earlier message didn’t post.

I’m very glad to see you taking a strong stand on this. I’m a former chair of the Salt Lake County Republican Party, with a J.D. from Cornell.

In 2008, after it had already been signed into law, I came across HB 493, which amended the stalking laws to include cyber-stalking, among other sweeping changes. I was appalled at how overbroad and vague the law was — especially considering that in Utah, you can get a civil stalking injunction ex parte, and then a violation of the injunction is a per se crime.

This is relevant in that (1) cyber-stalking is one of the misdemeanors Daw’s law includes; and (2) both the stalking laws and now the administrative subpoena laws were requested by Shurtleff, likely in connection with the “Rachel Guyon case” (google it if you haven’t already).

Another relevant case in all of this is Towner v. Ridgway. Towner referred to HB 493 as the Ridgway law and claimed to have worked with lawmakers “behind the scenes.” Please read the Utah Supreme Court opinion in this case; it will become clear that HB 493 made an already abused law a slam dunk in favor of suppression of political opponents.

I sent a letter to legislators in 2008 asking them to repeal 493. But a letter, without much more, didn’t generate much response or action. Now with HB 150, I’d really like to take more action BEFORE it becomes law.

There is a simple way to legally stop this kind of unconstitutional action:

Just use any free proxy IP server like these http://www.publicproxyservers.com/

The servers only stay online for a few hours and then disappear with no records existing.

The premise of the law is to stop child sex pornography but the open permission of the law would allow the state and feds to monitor and collect information from any “subversive” website including this one!

Bush also, ILLEGALLY, wrote into law that the telecoms companies who submitted data to the government without a warrant, not be held liable. This is in contravention of the ‘ex post facto’ provision in the constitution.

ALL legislatures seem to have missed the fact that the Constitution enumerates INALIENABLE rights. I.e. fundamental rights that belong to each individual and CANNOT be removed by State or Federal powers, no matter how many laws they wish to enact. Unfortunately silliness goes further in that the police and authorities will enforce an illegal law.

Your papers, including your email, are protected by the 4th amendment. To get them definitely requires a search warrant. The fact you received (or sent) an email is not protected; nor is the fact you received or sent a phone call / text message, nor are the billing records associated with a particular email address or phone number — these can all be requested administratively, ie, with a subpoena, in every state of which I have knowledge. Federal courts have also ruled affirmatively that this is the case. In my home state of Massachusetts, where virtually everyone is a card-carrying ACLU member, this is settled case law. I understand why this upsets people — I’m a privacy zealot myself — but individuals’ complaints that it violates the 4th amendment is unlikely to stop your state’s legislature, nor to convince a state or federal court.

I wrote a letter to Mr. Daw with an appeal to his supposedly limited-government values. I don’t expect to change his position, but I do want to make he or his campaign folks consider the ramifications of his positions in public opinion.

I am effectively making this letter a public letter by pasting it here in the comments; I hope you don’t mind me using your blog comments for such a soapbox.

Email letter text:
—

from Sean Upton
to brad@braddaw.com
date Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 11:19 AM
subject Values of limited government

Mr. Daw,

If you have a chance, please take a look at the discussion happening here:

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/02/24/025225/Utah-Considers-Warrantless-Internet-Subpoenas

I’m very much for limited government, just like you — but practically
applied, limited government and protection of private property means
that we need to respect the separation of powers and the Fourth
Amendment that puts reasonable power to solve law enforcement problems
with warrants issued by judges.

I’m a native Utahn living in California at the moment, but moving back
to my home state in a few months. I think that privacy, and the
respect of our founders’ boundaries of private property with the
careful use of warrants is a set of values that all Utahns can be
supportive of.

Net-savvy civil liberties should be nothing to be ashamed of on a
limited-government Conservative’s resume.

I, like you, work in technology; I see freedoms (especially privacy)
as a cornerstone of economic growth. China’s problems with Google,
for example, show that there will be a ceiling to post-industrial
growth (stifling the creative class and entrepreneurial ambition) with
excess government intrusion into the privacy and expression happening
in seemingly non-economic cases. I think we owe our citizens and the
world the best example for the world, setting ourselves apart in
public policy from the overarching tech-diminishing agendas of China
(or even Italy or Australia, also in the news for limiting Internet
liberties in economically problematic ways).

I hope you would reconsider aspects of your current position on this matter.

Thanks for your time.

Cheers,
Sean Upton

This should not be looked at as yet another blow to freedom as we think of it, rather it is another step down the slippery slope we have been on for some time.

Every day we lose a little more of our ability to fight back. A violent global revolution is the only answer, but we the sheeple no longer have the balls to do it and the elites know this.

Thank you for taking an ethical stand against an unreasonable power grab by the Utah legislature. This is a patriotic action.