Final time, you are painting with too broad a brush here.
Such an opinion is in fact validated, affirmed and proven by
NOT READING the text of the petitions in US Court:
I skimmed the first few pages. Guess what, it's exactly what I said it was. A protest about the scanners. You seem to be confusing the fact that I don't see how the scanners are unconstitutional (which I've discussed at length in this thread) with the fact the petition claims they are. Since I've already talked about this in this thread, and you dropped the subject, I figured we had dealt with it and I didn't have to go over the particular claim in the petition since it had been gone over here. The petition, as far as this thread is concerned, is just more of the same.
Now if you want to talk about that more, I'm find doing that.
"The deployment of Full Body Scanners in US airports, as currently proposed, violates the U.S. Constitution, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (“RFRA”), the Privacy Act of 1974(“Privacy Act”), and the Administrative Procedures Act (“APA”)."(Petition, April 21, 2010, page 1)."
The petition mentions the following concerns regarding the full body scanners:
- The TSA is making FBS the primary and mandatory method of security screening.
- The scanners violate the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution, protecting citizens from unreasonable searchs.
- The scanners perform a virtual "strip search" of each passenger.
According to the petition, hundreds of air travelers have filed complaints against the full body scanners, saying that the scans are invasive, that the TSA neglects to inform travelers about the body scanners, that travelers are not informed of alternative pat-down, and that the TSA has forced children and pregnant women into the body scanner, without identifying the scanner and telling the passengers what the scanner does.
Much more litigation is expected.
Again, while I am sure there are small problems here and there, the scanners themselves are not unconstitutional as far as I see. They are far from an unreasonable security measure, and they don't even show people nude (since they adjusted them to not do that). Again, just because someone claims something is an unreasonable search, does not make it so. There are very real and legitimate security concerns that the scanners help address for the safety not just of passengers, but other people in the country. A scan is
not invasive in the same way a strip search would be. It's not even as invasive as a pat down.
As for the "violations" of particular statutes, the FBS don't do that. I'll add a bit more on that in just a few minutes. (Edit: Added now)
I've gone over the 4th Amendment aspects already.
RFRA part is about the The Sherbert Test
From Wikipedia: It consists of four criteria that are used to determine if an individual's right to religious free exercise has been violated by the government. The test is as follows:
For the individual, the court must determine
* whether the person has a claim involving a sincere religious belief, and
* whether the government action is a substantial burden on the person’s ability to act on that belief.
If these two elements are established, then the government must prove
* that it is acting in furtherance of a "compelling state interest," and
* that it has pursued that interest in the manner least restrictive, or least burdensome, to religion.
Clearly there's compelling state interest.
Now one has to argue that the scanners are somehow more restrictive or burdensome than mandatory patdowns or the like. I think that's fairly obviously not the case. It would be a very tough argument to make.
Privacy Act
http://www.justice.gov/opcl/privstat.htm
It doesn't violate it, since....
(4) the term "record" means any item, collection, or grouping of information about an individual that is maintained by an agency, including, but not limited to, his education, financial transactions, medical history, and criminal or employment history and that contains his name, or the identifying number, symbol, or other identifying particular assigned to the individual, such as a finger or voice print or a photograph;
(5) the term "system of records" means a group of any records under the control of any agency from which information is retrieved by the name of the individual or by some identifying number, symbol, or other identifying particular assigned to the individual;
Since you can't put in someone's name/ID number/whatever and get the scanner record on them, it doesn't apply.
Administrative Procedures Act
I'll grant there have been some problems with how they've informed the public about their rules, and while this is important, it does not make for a case against FBS, but rather a case that the TSA needs to be more clear on things.
