Digitized and tattooed citizens

This wasn't supposed to happen here

[Reprinted from Issues & Views January 14, 2002]

Calls for a national identification number have sounded with alarming frequency since terrorists bombed the World Trade Center on September 11. Members of Congress and government officials insist that a national ID system can protect citizens, and the American public appears all too willing to relinquish its civil liberties for a superficial sense of security. In the aftermath of the attack, an AOL poll found 56 percent of 277,119 respondents agreeable to a national ID.

Unfortunately, to some extent, a national ID has already been created. In 1996 Congress mandated implementation of a national identification system by October 1, 2000. Anticipating public backlash, the legislation specifically stated that a national ID was not being created. Not true. . . .

Since September 11, national ID proponents have become bolder, supporting a broad, centralized federal database system using smart card IDs--cards with embedded computer chips. Supporters want ID cards for every citizen, including children. All Americans are to be numbered, located, and identified, essentially eliminating the need for census-taking. If such a system were created, pervasive monitoring could begin. Genetic and biometric identifiers, medical and bank records, FBI and police files, and education records may become instantly accessible to government officials. . . .

Financially motivated corporations are eager to help officials create the system. Oracle Chairman and CEO Larry Ellison has offered the U.S. government its database software for free--at least the initial set-up. Interviewed after the terrorist attack, Ellison said, "We need a national ID card with our photograph and thumbprint digitized and embedded in the ID card." Thomas Heeter of Houston, Texas thinks he has a better, albeit highly objectionable, idea for verifying identity. On March 2, 1999, Heeter received a U.S. patent for tattooing bar codes on humans.

In this new battle between good and evil, Congress must make terrorists the target, not the U.S. Constitution. To keep Congressional and government power in check, more than 150 organizations, 400 attorneys, and 40 computer specialists joined together on September 20 in a coalition called In Defense of Freedom.

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom," said William Pitt in 1783. With opportunists, policymakers, and profilers lining up to turn America into a nation of suspects, the civil liberties of Americans need all the protection they can get.

-- Twila Brase, excerpted from "We Must Not Give In To a National ID," Intellectual Capital, Nov.-Dec. 2001; she is a public health nurse and is president of Citizens' Council on Health Care.

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