They can't tell us what's secret.

On Independence Day 2002, multi-millionaire libertarian activist John Gilmore was forbidden to board a flight from either San Francisco or Oakland to Washington, D.C., when he refused to display a photo I.D. Gilmore, co-founder of the Electronic Freedom Foundation, filed a federal lawsuit challenging federal guidelines behind the widespread airline industry practice of demanding I.D. from air travelers. As the August-September 2003 issue of Reason pointed out, federal attorneys urged that the case be thrown out of court because "the ID regulation in question is 'sensitive security information' and must remain secret."

That demand gave rise to an interesting exchange between Federal District Judge Susan Illston and Justice Department lawyer Joe Lobue. When the judge asked, "What is the rule, if at all, concerning identification?" Lobue replied by summarizing the Bush administration's argument that requesting ID is a matter of public safety. "I understand, you said all of that [in opening arguments]," said Judge Illston. Pointing out that Gilmore's complaint that the federal rule in question was void because of vagueness, the judge continued: "You were saying the rule is not void for vagueness and we can move on. I just want to know what the rule is that isn't void." "If you are asking me to disclose what's in the security directives, I can't do it," insisted Lobue.

Now that the Gilmore case has moved to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, the feds have asked that the court "keep its arguments secret," reported USA Today on September 7. Allowing publication of court arguments over the still-secret directive "would be detrimental to the security of transportation."

"We're dealing with the government's review of a secret law that now they want a secret judicial review for," complained James Harrison, an attorney for Gilmore. "This administration's use of a secret law is more dangerous to the security of the nation than any external threat."

One illustration of the fact that the Bush administration's addiction to official secrecy has little to do with public safety is found in its attempt to "redact"--that is, censor--an innocuous passage in an ACLU court brief in a lawsuit over the Patriot Act.

"Ostensibly, [the administration] would use their powers of censorship only to remove material that truly could jeopardize US operations," comments media analyst William Rivers Pitt. "But in reality, what did they do? They blacked out a quotation from a Supreme Court decision." The citation--removed for "national security reasons" reads as follows: "The danger to political dissent is acute where the Government attempts to act under so vague a concept as the power to protect 'domestic security.' Given the difficulty of defining the domestic security interest, the danger of abuse in acting to protect that interest becomes apparent."