WASHINGTON - June 9, 2008 - Senators Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) authored a bill (with 11 co-sponsors, including Senator Barack Obama) that was incorporated into a housing bill passed by the Senate Banking Committee, 19-2, before the Memorial Day recess - a bill that creates a national fingerprint registry.

According to a Martinez press release, the language merely “create[s] national licensing and oversight standards for residential mortgage originators.”

One of the standards, John Berlau of the Competitive Enterprise Institute says, may “require thousands of individuals working even tangentially in the mortgage and real estate industries - and not suspected of anything - to send their prints to the Feds.”

This is a step in the wrong direction - at least for a nation that values and preserves freedom.