This ruling by U. S. District Court Judge Richard Leon is a positive step in asserting individual rights under the Fourth Amendment, which states:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

How 15 judges on the Foreign Intelligence Service Court determined this collection of massive metadata of the phone records of citizens of the United States is constitutional under Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act is beyond the scope of reason.

We know this is not over by a long shot, but at least people are fighting this violation of one of our most basic rights: the right to be secure and to not have our private information collected without probable cause.  It may be harmless now, but in the hands of the wrong people this information could be used against law abiding citizens to deprive them of their Constitutional rights.  A bigger question is why hasn’t Congress stopped the NSA collection of this data?  Where are they?