Rand Paul: “I rise in opposition to the government listening to your phone calls, reading your emails, or reading your text messages…”

“I rise in opposition to the government listening to your phone calls, reading your emails, or reading your text messages without a warrant. It doesn't mean the government will never do this, but it means they would have to ask a judge. They would have to ask a judge if they have probable cause that you committed a crime. They would have to name you. They would have to name the information they want. It is called the Fourth Amendment. All Americans deserve the protection of the Fourth Amendment. In fact, I believe it was John Adams who said that James Otis's argument against blanket warrants, against generalized warrants that they called writs of assistance--he said that the argument James Otis made in the 1760s was the spark that led to the American Revolution. Lincoln is said to have written that any man can stand adversity, but if you want to challenge a man or a woman, give them power. Over almost 1,000 years, the history of Western civilization has been the struggle to contain the power of the monarch, the struggle to contain and maintain the power of the government in every form. From Magna Carta on, it has been the people trying to take power back from either the monarchy or a despotic government. We get to the formation of our government, and Jefferson wrote that the Constitution would be the change, that the government would be bound up in the change. Patrick Henry wrote that the Constitution is meant to restrain the government, not the people.…”