What’s the point in celebrating the Constitution one day a year if we permit the government to violate it the other 364? September 17 marks the anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution, a document designed not merely to establish a government but to restrain it. Yet restraint is in increasingly short supply. Across the political spectrum, Americans continue to tolerate abuses of power so long as those abuses are carried out by the “right” people, against the “wrong” people, or in...

After the 9/11 attacks, US officials used the “emergency” to wield and exercise extraordinary totalitarian-like powers. This was reflected by such totalitarian-like measures as the USA PATRIOT Act, warrantless telecommunications surveillance, torture, indefinite detention, assassination, the TSA takeover of the airports, and the undeclared wars of aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq. Of course, that isn’t the only time US officials have used an “emergency” to justify the use of...