Specter said White House negotiators worked for weeks with lawyers from his office to hammer out a bill that would allow a "one-time review" of the warrantless wiretap program under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

"The whole program, kit and kaboodle, should go to the courts" for approval under the legislation, Specter said, predicting the bill would have no problem clearing Congress.

In applying to use the wiretap program in the future, the administration would have to provide "an explanation as to how the program is reasonably designed to ensure that the communications intercepted involve a terrorist, agent of a terrorist, or someone reasonably believed to have communicated or associated with a terrorist," Specter said.

The Republican senator said the deal treads a fine line between protecting civil liberties of Americans and providing the administration needed tools to combat terrorism.

"I believe this is a very important matter for balancing the country's need to fight terrorism," Specter said.

He added: "The president does not have a blank check. It is a balancing. It is a weighing of the interests of security to fight terrorism with privacy interests."

Some in Congress however decried the use of what they called a "closed-door deal" between Specter and the White House, at the very time when critics are calling for greater transparency in how and when the White House uses this and other secret programs as it fights the US war on terror.

The deal "should not exempt the secret program from thorough congressional scrutiny," Democratic Representative Ed Markey said in a statement after the agreement was announced.

"The closed-door deal reached with Senator Specter should be the beginning of full congressional review of the program and any legislation that is based on the agreement -- not the end of the story," said Markey.

"The secret domestic surveillance program has operated in the shadows - now is the time for the courts and the Congress to shed some light on it," he said.

Specter told reporters that the legislation would in some respects strengthen the provisions of the original FISA bill, which passed in 1978.

The proposed new bill gives the administration "greater flexibility" by allowing it to take seven days, rather than the current three, before asking the FISA court for wiretap authority.

Specter said the legislation also would modify existing law to allow a "roving wiretap" -- "that is, to follow the individual, as opposed to a fixed telephone," he said.

"I think we got a pragmatic result. It allays a lot of concerns" about violation of civil liberties, he added.

The electronic surveillance program sparked a firestorm after its existence was first disclosed in December by the New York Times.

But administration officials at hearings earlier this week urged Congress to pass legislation enacting Bush's military commissions, with some minor changes.

"Hadley told us in a meeting face to face that we would use the UCMJ as a basis," McCain, an Arizona Republican, said. "I don't know what to make of this."

Congress is crafting a process to try terrorism suspects -- mostly held at the U.S. naval facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- after the Supreme Court slapped down the commissions system Bush established in the wake of the September 11 attacks.

Bush has faced international criticism for the indefinite detention and allegations of mistreatment of detainees, mostly scooped up in the war in Afghanistan.

U.S. military judge advocates general, appearing before the
Senate Armed Services Committee, agreed Congress should not ratify the current system. Most said Congress should base legislation on the military justice code, but with changes to allow interrogations without legal counsel, protect classified information, allow some hearsay testimony and other measures.

'NOT CONSISTENT'

That follows the course advocated by Democrats and a number of Senate Republicans.

Sen. John Warner, the committee's chairman, said he was "somewhat perplexed" by administration testimony earlier this week which he said was "not consistent with what the national security adviser told me."

The White House was working through differing views and planned to present a policy soon after Bush returns from the Group of Eight summit in Russia, the Virginia Republican said.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, speaking to reporters, appeared to back more limited legal rights, saying he believed the best way to try the cases "is through military commissions, and we want to get on with it."

A number of House of Representatives Republicans also indicated they likely would back much of the current system, setting up a potential clash with the Senate. They said the military code, geared to protect U.S. uniformed personnel, would give terrorism suspects too many rights and compromise national security.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, an Alabama Republican, also was skeptical of using the military code for "unlawful combatants," many of whom he said were "obsessively committed to suicidal destruction of American lives."

Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts said Congress must clarify Geneva Convention language barring inhumane treatment of prisoners that the Supreme Court said applied to U.S.-held detainees.

Interrogators who got information leading to last month's killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al Qaeda's leader in
Iraq, "could conceivably be held accountable" for war crimes under current language, the Kansas Republican said.

"There is not a long history of this. There have not been a lot of terrorist prosecutions in civilian courts," said Aitan Goelman, a former Justice Department terrorism prosecutor now in private practice in Washington.

Padilla is a U.S. citizen once accused by the Bush administration of plotting to detonate a radioactive "dirty bomb."

U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke's order, issued July 5, allows Padilla to view 32 Defense Department documents that summarize statements Padilla made during his years in military custody. He also can examine 57 videotapes of interrogations he underwent during that same period.

Padilla's attorneys said in court papers that they must examine the materials with their client to discover whether he was mistreated by interrogators, to refresh his memory and find possible leads for their defense, and to ensure that prosecutors have turned over all necessary material.

The attorneys and a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Miami declined to comment Thursday on the arrangement. It was unclear whether Padilla had already begun examining the documents.

Security will be extraordinarily tight for the sessions. Padilla will be brought to a secure inner area in the court complex but the door must remain open so a U.S. marshal can keep constant watch.

Cooke's order said the marshal must maintain "an appropriate distance" to prevent overhearing defense trial strategy. But if the marshal does overhear, "those communications shall not be communicated to any member of the government prosecution team," the judge said.

The challenge in national security cases is in striking a balance between a defendant's right to prepare an adequate defense and the government's interest in protecting its secrets, particularly sources and methods used to obtain intelligence.

"I think the government, in an abundance of caution these days, is protecting as much as it can," said Carl Tobias, law professor at the University of Richmond. "There is a tension between his constitutional rights to defend himself and see the evidence against him on the one hand and national security on the other hand."

Padilla and two co-defendants are scheduled to go to trial in September on charges of conspiracy and providing material support to Islamic extremist groups around the country. All three have pleaded not guilty.

Padilla, a former Chicago gang member and south Florida resident, was arrested in 2002 at O'Hare Airport. Authorities claimed then he had plotted to set off a "dirty bomb" as an al-Qaida soldier, but the Miami indictment does not mention that.

A co-defendant, Kifah Wael Jayyousi, had sought dismissal of the charges against him on grounds that they were based on his newsletter, the Islam Report, which he contended deserved free speech protections.

But a federal magistrate ruled Monday that the charges also involved terror fundraising and recruitment, and said the indictment should stand.

"The liberties and freedom embedded in the right to vote must remain sacred," House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said in a statement. "Principles like these cannot wait for discrimination to rear its ugly head."

Southern conservatives complained that the act punishes their states for racist voting histories they say they've overcome.

"By passing this rewrite of the Voting Rights Act, Congress is declaring from on high that states with voting problems 40 years ago can simply never be forgiven," said Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga., one of several lawmakers pressing for changes to the law to ease its requirements on Southern states.

"I sincerely hope the U.S. Senate corrects these problems so when the bill returns to the House for final passage I can vote for it," said Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., whose state is one of those under federal scrutiny.

The House overwhelmingly rejected amendments that would have shortened the renewal from 25 years to a decade and would have struck its requirement that ballots in some states be printed in several languages.

Supporters of the law as written called the amendments "poison pills" designed to kill the renewal because if any were adopted by the full House, the underlying renewal might have failed.

Supporters used stark images and emotional language to make clear that the pain of racial struggle - and racist voting practices - still stings.

Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., displayed photos of civil rights activists, including himself, who were beaten by Alabama state troopers in 1965 as they marched from Selma to Montgomery in support of voting rights.

"I have a concussion. I almost died. I gave blood; some of my colleagues gave their very lives," Lewis shouted from the House floor, while the Rev. Jesse Jackson, another veteran of the civil rights movement, looked on from the gallery.

"Yes, we've made some progress; we have come a distance," Lewis added. "The sad truth is, discrimination still exists. That's why we still need the Voting Rights Act and we must not go back to the dark past."

The very debate over changes to the act is testament to the influence of Southern conservatives, even over their own GOP leaders who had hoped to pass the renewal as a fresh appeal for support from minorities on Election Day.

With rare bipartisan support among leaders of the House and Senate, the renewal was widely expected to sail through Congress and on to the White House for President Bush's signature.

Republican leaders, however, were forced to postpone a House vote last month when conservatives rebelled during a closed meeting.

Unable to satisfy the dissenters and eager to pass the bill this week, Republican leaders announced late Wednesday they would allow the House to consider amendments, none of which passed.

The amendment that would have extended the act for a decade, rather than the 25 years in the bill, was rejected 288-134. The proposal to strike requirements in the law that ballots in districts with large populations of non-English speakers be printed in other languages failed 238-185.

"What unites us? It's our language, the English language," said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif. Without the amendment, the act is "hurting America by making it easier not to learn English."

Democrats made clear early in the day they would vote against the renewal if any of the amendments were added.

"Any one of them would be a weakening of the Voting Rights Act," said Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California.

The White House also weighed in during the debate, saying in a statement that the Bush administration "supports the intent" of the renewal. The statement did not take a position on the amendments proposed by lawmakers who represented the GOP's conservative base.

Their objections to the renewal already were being echoed by some Senate colleagues from the same states.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., noted that the act doesn't expire until next year.

"It's 13 months away and we're creating a political situation that doesn't need to be created," Coburn said in an interview. He said changes such as those proposed by the House amendments needed time for consideration.

Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., called lawmakers who wanted to loosen the requirements in the law "ideological soul mates" of lawmakers who opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

"For them, this is not a debate about fairness, it is about ideology. Ideology has no place in today's debate," Hastings said. "We should do this not for the partisan benefit but because, as John Kennedy said, it is right."

The bill is HR-9.

"Basically, you've given everybody a little radio-frequency doodad that silently declares 'Hey, I'm a foreigner,'" says author and futurist Bruce Sterling, who lectures on the future of RFID technology. "If nobody bothers to listen, great. If people figure out they can listen to passport IDs, there will be a lot of strange and inventive ways to exploit that for criminal purposes."

RFID chips are used in security passes many companies issue to employees. They don't have to be touched to a reader-machine, only waved near it. Following initial objections by security and privacy experts, the State Department added several security precautions.

But experts still fear the data could be "skimmed," or read remotely without the bearer's knowledge.

Kidnappers, identity thieves and terrorists could all conceivably commit "contactless" crimes against victims who wouldn't know they've been violated until after the fact.

"The basic problem with RFID is surreptitious access to ID," said Bruce Schneier security technologist, author and chief technology officer of Counterpane Internet Security, a technology security consultancy. "The odds are zero that RFID passport technology won't be hackable."

The State Department argues the concerns are overstated. "We wouldn't be issuing the passports to ourselves if we didn't think they're secure," said Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Passport Services Frank Moss, who noted that RFID passports have already been issued to core State Department personnel, including himself. "We're our own test population."

How skimming works

The equipment needed to skim an RFID chip neither has to be large nor expensive. Nokia sells cell phones capable of reading RFID chips. Texas Instruments sells kits to do the same thing.

In May, researchers at the University of Tel Aviv created a skimmer from electronics hobbyist kits costing less than $110. The equipment was small enough to fit into a briefcase or be disguised in any manner of luggage or clothes that could hide the 15-inch copper tube antenna.

The antenna boosts the read-range from a few inches to a few feet. To extend the range of surreptitious access much further, a second piece of equipment is needed to fake the RFID reader into sending a "read" signal, which is then relayed via radio waves to the skimmer's reader near the targeted RFID chip.

In 2005, a researcher at Cambridge extended the range to about 160 feet while successfully accessing a contactless smart card's details.

ID thieves who figure out a way around the security precaution on RFID passports, which includes anti-skimming material in the cover, can use this method in a crowded airport terminal or hotel lobby to conceivably "borrow" someone's ID data and spoof it to another official reader, effectively cloaking themselves in another's persons ID.

Or they could learn a person's nationality, or confirm the identity of someone they were searching for to harm.

"It's a great way for unfriendly elements to set up their own RFID scanning systems and pick Americans right out of a crowd...If you put an RFID scanner in a doorway or maybe a lamp-post," said Sterling, "you can just sit there automatically counting the passing passports."

Even if the skimmed data is encrypted -- as e-Passport information would be -- skilled hackers could potentially save the information and crack it elsewhere.

Researchers at the Dutch security test lab Riscure cracked the encryption on a mocked up RFID passport in two hours using a PC in 2005.

U.S. passports are issued for ten years, which means the RFID chip technology of those passports, along with their vulnerabilities, will be floating around for a decade. Technology would have to "stop cold" Schneier of Counterpane says for improvements in skimming and hacking equipment not to occur.

Moss said the State Department "recognizes that technology will change during the 10 year life cycle of US passports" and that's why it's focusing on more than one technology to protect data.

Sterling, however, compares RFID passports to a "nice yellow armband" -- a big sign on your body announcing your identity. "Would you pay anything for that device?" Sterling asks. "Would you buy it in a travel store because you thought it made you feel safer? Or would you conclude that this technology existed so that you could be treated like a can on a grocery-food shelf?"

Schneier says there are a number of ways to improve the security of RFID passports but the best trick is to not create RFID passports at all. "Someone in the government got it in their head to make it RFID. Yes, its cool technology," said Schneier, "but don't do it because it's cool."

The ProVision system, developed by L-3 SafeView, reveals the presence of explosives and concealed objects anywhere on the body in as little as two seconds. The system uses state-of-the-art, non ionizing active millimeter wave (MMW) imaging technology to detect virtually any material, including wire, liquid, ceramic, plastic, and metal.

"The vulnerability of the nation's transit systems to terrorist threats cannot be overemphasized," said Thomas Ripp, president of L-3 Security and Detection Systems.

"Protecting the public requires a comprehensive, realistic, and forward-thinking approach to mass transit security. L-3 is dedicated to bringing the very best technology to bear on this vital mission, and we're very pleased to be part of this critically important project."

Used to screen travelers at some of the world's busiest airports, including Mexico City and Amsterdam's Schiphol, a key advantage of ProVision over alternative body screening methods or technologies is the system's high throughput rates.

"Maintaining passenger throughput levels is essential, especially in high-traffic situations," Mr. Ripp added. "In demonstrating ProVision's consistent performance at a rail station with high ridership, we are making the case that thorough, accurate, and reliable passenger screening is easily achievable. We can detect a wider range of threats, dramatically increase the likelihood of detecting them, and protect the public to a greater degree than ever before."

Serving more than 200,000 passengers each weekday, the PATH's Exchange Place Station is the primary rail transit link between lower Manhattan and New Jersey.

L-3's novel body-screening portals have enhanced security at railway stations in the UK, border crossings in Israel, international airports, ferry landings in Singapore, and government and commercial buildings in The Hague and Tokyo. L-3 SafeView portals also safeguard soldiers and workers in Iraq's Green Zone.

Earlier this year, L-3 participated in the first phase of the RSP, screening passenger baggage at Exchange Place Station with its APS-II checkpoint X-ray system. Combining powerful material analysis technology and dual X-ray data to reveal the most cleverly masked suspicious substances, L-3's APS-II automatically analyzes each piece of baggage and automatically signals the presence of threat substances and contraband, including narcotics.

The port authorities of New York and New Jersey collaborated with the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate's (DHS S&T) Countermeasures Test Beds program on the trial.