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The spirit becomes free only when it ceases to be a support. Franz Kafka |
Bruce Fein is a lawyer in the United States who specializes in constitutional and international law. Fein has written numerous articles on constitutional issues for The Washington Times, Slate.com, The New York Times, Legal Times, and is active on the issues of civil liberties. He has also worked for the American Enterprise Institute and the Heritage Foundation, both conservative think tanks, as an analyst and commentator.
Fein is a principal in a government affairs and public relations firm, The Lichfield Group, in Washington, D.C.. He is also a resident scholar at the Turkish Coalition of America.
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Bruce Fein was born in 1943 and raised in San Francisco. He received his degree in law from Harvard Law School in 1972.
Fein was a top Justice Department official under the Reagan administration. He has heavily criticized every subsequent U.S. President.
Under President Ronald Reagan, Fein served as an associate deputy attorney general from 1981 to 1982 and as general counsel to the Federal Communications Commission. During that period, he wrote an extensive 30-page critique of Times v. Sullivan, the Supreme Court ruling that freed American media from much of its liability under libel law in the United States. That memorandum was briefly misattributed to Judge John Roberts while his nomination to be Chief Justice of the United States was pending. In 1987, he served as the minority (minority party) research director of the committee in the United States House of Representatives that investigated the Iran-Contra Affair.
The George W. Bush administration's terrorist surveillance program which intercepted some communications without a warrant from the FISA court incensed him enough to propose censure or even impeachment of Bush. He ridiculed Harriett Miers's Supreme Court nomination, and was sharply criticical of then-U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
In March 2007,he founded the American Freedom Agenda with Bob Barr, David Keene and Richard Viguerie. Notable published writings by Fein include articles advocating the impeachment of former U.S. presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, and former U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney.
On September 2, 2008, Fein addressed Ron Paul's "Rally For The Republic" in Minneapolis, offering a critique of the Bush administration's interventionist policy and advocating a more non-interventionist foreign policy. Fein also harshly criticized the anti-terror policies of the Bush White House, including wiretapping and detention of terror suspects. In April 2009, Fein criticized President Barack Obama for declining to prosecute Bush administration officials for composing CIA memos justifying torture during interrogations.
In 2011, Fein proposed impeaching President Barack Obama in connection with the 2011 military intervention in Libya.
Fein has acted "on behalf of Tamils Against Genocide" related to espouse their cause, i.e. to present parts of the Sri Lankan Civil War as Tamil Genocide. It included attempts to bring criminal charges against some American citizens who are prominent members of the Sri Lankan government.
As a scholar at the Turkish Coalition of America (TCA), and in collaboration with the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund, Fein actively participates in the Armenian-Turkish dispute with regard to their shared history.
Bruce Fein has penned more than one column on the topic, including in The Washington Times and The Huffington Post. As opposed to the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Fein asserts that the fate of Armenians during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I should not be characterized as a genocide, arguing that racial, ethnic or religious motivation for the deaths cannot be proven and that a 'political or military motivation for a death falls outside the definition.' He argued: "Armenian casualties from starvation, disease, and Ottoman Muslim killings were painfully high, perhaps 300,000-600,000. [...] The tragic Armenian losses and suffering deserve sympathy and commemoration, but no more so than their Ottoman Muslim counterparts."
His first action as a lawyer was to participate, in the name of the Assembly of Turkish American Associations to the court case against Mourad Topalian, sentenced in 2001 for illegal storing of war weapons and explosives, linked to a terrorist group, the Justice Commandos against Armenian Genocide.
Together with David Saltzman, he was the lawyer of Guenter Lewy against the Southern Poverty Law Center. After to have filed a complaint, the TALDF obtained a public statement of retraction and apologies from SPLC, and a monetary compensation to Prof. Lewy. Bruce Fein is also one of the lawyers of Rep. Jean Schmidt against David Krikorian and of TCA against University of Minnesota. The House ethics committee recently found that Fein had misled Schmidt by failing to disclose to her that his fees in connection with the litigation against David Krikorian were being paid by the TCA.
American Empire: Before the Fall, the most recent of Fein’s published works, condemns the aggressive foreign policy of the United States for being devoid of concrete objectives, and as such, doomed to war in perpetuity. According to Fein, foreign policy as it stands is earmarked by domination for the sake of domination and gaping wounds to the rule of law and separation of powers. Fein writes: "The larger national motivation is to dominate the world for the excitement of domination. The narrower particular motivation of the President is to reduce coequal branches of government to vassalage, to place the President above the law, and to justify secret government without accountability. James Madison’s admonitions about presidential wars have been vindicated."
Campaign for Liberty commissioned and published American Empire: Before the Fall. This was their first foray into the realm of publishing. Fein's message therein has been well-received by politicians and pundits from across the political spectrum. Ron Paul (via Campaign for Liberty), Ralph Nader, Glenn Greenwald, Judge Andrew Napolitano, US Representative Walter B. Jones, Jr., and many other prominent political figures have publicly declared their concurrence with Fein's analysis. Glenn Greenwald wrote: "The central problem Fein examines — the nation’s conduct as a world-dominating imperial power rather than a republic — infects and exacerbates virtually every serious political and cultural problem. It drains our financial resources and threatens the country with debt-fueled collapse. It precludes spending on the welfare of American citizens for education, infrastructure and entitlements for the needy. It is what justifies the endless erosion of civil liberties and the acquiescence of limitless, unchecked power to the Executive Branch. It is what causes the nation to be plagued by a bloated, borderline-omnipotent National Security and Surveillance State. It even ironically weakens us militarily and renders us far more vulnerable to attack via overstretch and commitments beyond our means. And most of all, it degrades the American character by reducing us to a militaristic, war-fighting state, wallowing in our own fears, insecurities, hatreds and weaknesses."
Constitutional Peril was the first book authored by Fein intended for the general public. It was published while President Bush remained in office in 2008, and it made an impassioned argument in favor of impeachment for the President’s unparalleled expansion of executive authority and multiple defilements of the rule of law. Fein's argument was presented on national television programs including Bill Moyers' Journal.
Ron Paul is among the most notable consistent proponents of Fein's political commentary. He is quoted on the cover of Constitutional Peril saying: "Bruce Fein is one of the most important legal minds of our time. Constitutional Peril is a must-read for American lovers of liberty."
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