Another small victory in the struggle

According to Friday's Washington Post,

[a] federal judge has ruled that some provisions of the U.S. Patriot Act dealing with foreign terrorist organizations remain too vague to be understood by a person of average intelligence and are therefore unconstitutional.

U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins found that Congress failed to remedy all the problems she defined in a 2004 ruling that struck down key provisions of the act. Her decision was handed down Thursday and released Friday.

The case involved the intent for groups and individuals in the US to provide support to two political organizations in Asia: The Liberation Tigers in Sri Lanka and a Kurdish group in Turkey, Partiya Karkeran Kurdistan. The US considers them both foreign terrorist organizations and bans

providing material support or resources, including "training," "expert advice or assistance," "personnel" and "service"

to such groups.

People who wanted to provide relief, including in the former case tsunami relief, through the groups argued that without a clear definition of what those terms mean, people trying to support legal, nonviolent work of blacklisted groups could face 15 years in prison. Collins, while agreeing with the government on the word "personnel," agreed with the plaintiffs on the other terms.

Unfortunately, the victory is indeed a small one: Collins

specified that her ruling applies only to the named plaintiffs and does not constitute a nationwide injunction.

That's a rather bizarre ruling in one sense: Can the term "training" be impermissibly vague in reference to the Liberation Tigers but crystal clear in reference to another group? I wonder if Collins, by limiting her ruling in that way, was figuring it would be less likely to be overturned.