The most recent National Defense Authorization Act was an unprecedented attack on fundamental civil liberties afforded to citizens by The Constitution. Due process is a right that even the founders of this nation thought of as a pillar of a free and just society. The NDAA provides the government the power to indefinitely detain U.S. citizens without trial for the first time in history. When signing this bill into law President Obama felt a need to include a signing statement that his administration will not use it for this purpose but that does not guarantee that it will ever be used in that way. So I petition the Obama administration to explain why a signing statement (which is not legally binding) was sufficient when a line item veto would have been more effective.
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