In the next few days, members of Congress are expected to sit down to finalize a Patriot Act reauthorization bill out of the competing measures passed by the House of Representatives and the Senate. Although there will undoubtedly be future opportunities to amend discrete sections of the 2001 law, for those of us supporting proper reform, this really is zero hour.

The House bill leaves a lot to be desired. It would keep in place almost all of the deficiencies in the original Patriot Act. The Senate bill, although not comprehensive in its corrections, at least would make meaningful and needed reforms to some of the most troubling provisions. I urge conferees from both parties to protect the improvements in the Senate bill.

Crucially, as a former prosecutor and intelligence official, I am convinced the Senate bill would not in any way hamper federal counterterrorism operations, as some claim. Rather than restricting the type or amount of information that can be collected through surveillance, physical searches or the gathering of personal records, it would simply add a few modest safeguards, such as new reporting requirements or judicial approval, to protect against abuse or misuse. More important, it would help ensure that these powerful tools are trained on those who would do us harm and not wasted on gathering information about American citizens who have no connection whatsoever to foreign terrorists.

Let’s talk specifics. Consider, for example, the Senate bill’s proposed changes to Section 215 of the Patriot Act. This section allows the government to use classified orders from the secret court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to seize personal records in intelligence or terrorism cases.

Under current law, the FBI can apply to the FISA court to demand personal records from doctors, libraries, hotels, colleges or any other business in America without showing the court any facts connecting those records to a suspected terrorist. In fact, to obtain a secret Section 215 order, the government need not have any information suggesting that the people whose records are sought have done anything wrong. Agents merely have to claim that the records themselves are sought for “an authorized” counterintelligence or counterterrorism investigation; or course, the government itself decides whether an investigation is “authorized.”

Once that is done, the issuing judge has no legal authority to deny the request. Worse, the whole matter is subject to strict classification, and the recipient of the 215 order is gagged forever from telling anyone about the order.

Rather than limiting the scope of Section 215, the Senate bill slightly raises the “show and tell” threshold for agents seeking these orders. Under the bill, they would have to present a statement of facts asserting at least some link between the private records being sought and a foreign agent or foreign power. It would also create a meaningful way to challenge a 215 order and would require the approval of the FBI director for records relating to reading habits, firearms or medical records.

The Senate bill would also slightly increase privacy protections for “roving wiretaps” (wiretaps that follow the person, not the phone) in intelligence and terrorism investigations.

The Senate bill would also create a presumptive, seven-day limit on how long investigators can delay telling you they searched your home or business using a “sneak and peek” warrant, which the courts are authorized to issue under Section 213 of the Patriot Act.

Late this summer, a federal judge allowed the ACLU to disclose publicly the existence of a sealed lawsuit, filed on behalf of a member of the American Library Association, which holds book-borrowing and Internet records on library patrons, that was served with a “national-security letter.” This is a power expanded by the Patriot Act to allow a wide range of information from financial institutions and Internet service providers to be issued by the FBI without judicial approval and, like Section 215, without showing any facts connecting the records sought to an agent of a foreign power who is a target of an intelligence investigation. Neither bill adequately reforms this far-reaching power, which ought to be a concern for every American citizen and business.

The prevailing concern among both conservatives and liberals who seek to reform the Patriot Act is that the marked absence of checks and balances in certain sections will inevitably lead to fishing expeditions or investigations of Americans based on their views, rather than wrongful acts. What’s the easiest way for that to happen? Find out what you read, whom you associate with, what you’ve bought and what you think.

That’s why our Founders included special protections in the Constitution for freedom of conscience in our First Amendment and included a Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches of our homes, persons or effects. The Patriot Act violates the spirit, if not the letter, of these constitutional limits on government power. The Senate bill would make it better — not perfect — but the House bill would make the law worse. The constitutional choice is clear.

Barr is a former Republican member of Congress from Georgia.

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