No Blind Rush in War Against Terrorist Violence

By June of 1995, seven weeks after the Oklahoma City bombing, Congress had taken up the Comprehensive Terrorism Prevention Act. Most of the legislation’s provisions were sensible, but two things that President Clinton had proposed to help combat terrorism were rejected by Congress. This newspaper supported one and was troubled by the other.

Now, the Olympic Centennial Park bombing, which killed two people and injured 111 others early Saturday, and the possibility that terrorism was responsible for the explosion of TWA Flight 800 have had new and heavy impacts on the national consciousness. On Monday, as bomb threats continued to rock Atlanta, the two rejected provisions reappeared on Clinton’s “discussion” list as anti-terrorism tools. This time, bipartisan congressional leadership has promised full cooperation.

The issues are “taggants” and wiretaps. The Times, as it did after the Oklahoma City bombing, agrees with the notion of requiring taggants--markers added to an explosive during its manufacture--to help track down criminal bombers. (Some experts, however, argue that this method of detection is far from foolproof.)

On the matter of wiretapping expansion, as The Times noted Monday in this space, discussion is necessary. This is particularly important regarding so-called “roving wiretaps,” which would allow police to tap all phones and communications devices (such as a pager) used by a suspect without separate court orders for each tap. Clinton talked Monday about “very specific and limited use” of wiretaps. What does the president mean?

For example, Justice Department statistics show that the Clinton administration has already obtained substantial increases in the number of federal court orders allowing wiretaps and other electronic surveillance in criminal cases being pursued by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI. The use of devices that record the telephone numbers of incoming calls on a specific line has increased. And the time limit on existing wiretaps in surveillance cases has risen sharply.

All this leads to several questions: What is the actual prosecution rate of those cases? Why are current efforts not considered sufficient? Why shouldn’t court orders be required for every requested tap? The discussion should not proceed without the answers.

Americans want to feel better protected against domestic and foreign-inspired terrorism, but they will not go blindly down that path.