| Republican patriot act curbing bill defeated by Whitehouse { July 9 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active) http://www.suntimes.com/output/terror/cst-nws-patriot09.htmlhttp://www.suntimes.com/output/terror/cst-nws-patriot09.html
Bipartisan bid to curb Patriot Act falls short in House July 9, 2004 BY ALAN FRAM
WASHINGTON -- The Republican-led House bowed to a White House veto threat Thursday and stood by the USA Patriot Act, defeating an effort to block the part of the anti-terrorism law that helps the government investigate people's reading habits.
The effort to defy President Bush and bridle the law's powers lost by 210-210, with a majority needed to prevail. The amendment appeared on its way to victory as the roll call's normal 15-minute time limit expired, but GOP leaders kept the vote open for 23 more minutes as they persuaded about 10 Republicans who initially supported the provision to change their votes.
''Shame, shame, shame,'' Democrats chanted as the minutes passed and votes were switched.
''You win some, and some get stolen,'' Rep. C.L. Butch Otter (R-Idaho), a sponsor of the defeated provision and one of Congress' more conservative members, told a reporter.
The effort to curb the Patriot Act was pushed by a coalition of Democrats and conservative Republicans.
The House has voted before to block portions of the 2001 law, but Congress has never succeeded in rolling back any of it. Yet neither has Bush succeeded in his quest to expand some of its powers.
The law, enacted in the weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, gave the government stronger powers to conduct investigations and detain people.
Otter and Rep. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt.) led the effort to block one section of the law that lets authorities get special court orders requiring book dealers, libraries and others to surrender records such as purchases and Internet sites visited on a library computer. They contended the provision undermines civil liberties and threatens to let the government snoop into the reading habits of innocent Americans.
AP
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