mr. chairman , i will certainly vote for this amendment , but i fear that it does not fully solve the problem that has been identified by many . 
before the patriot act , the government could obtain only limited records from hotels , storage facilities and car rental companies , and only if those documents pertained to an agent of a foreign power . 
now , the government can seek any records from anyone as long as it is relevant to an investigation . 
the fisa court does not really have any discretion to deny these requests and , once they are granted , they are subject to a gag order . 
now , the justice department has told us that they have never once used section 215 relative to libraries , and i have no reason to disbelieve them ; but the american library association reports that they have received 200 formal or informal requests for materials , presumably under some other section of the law , perhaps grand jury subpoenas , i do not know . 
the fact is that americans are aware of this issue , and i believe this is having a chilling effect on first amendment rights in terms of reading and speaking . 
i believe it is important that government have the opportunity to obtain records when it is necessary to fight terrorism . 
i do believe , however , that the relevance standard is too low . 
i also believe that when the house that previously approved a carve-out for identifiable information from libraries it spoke about the chilling impact . 
i believe we have a better way to get these records and also to untrouble readers . 
so while i will support the amendment , it falls short of what is necessary . 
