1996 Anti-terrorism Act

The revolution inside John Ashcroft's Justice Department—an array of new crime-prevention powers embodied in the Patriot Act—has been fueled by the attorney general's ambition, intelligence, and unusually extreme beliefs about everything from the similarities between himself and Jesus to the post-9/11 role of law enforcement, to the purported demonic properties of calico cats. But as nervous sources share stories of his Missouri governorship, and former staffers and Senate allies speak out, JUDY BACHRACH discovers that Ashcroft has also sparked a growing backlash, one with surprisingly bipartisan power