Justice Department says legal opinion on Executive orders is classified

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The Bush Administration's Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel is refusing to turn over a document providing its analysis of Bush's justification for executive orders.

Responding to a Freedom of Information Act request from the Federation of American Scientists, the office said the document was "classified."

"For years, under the Bush administration, the Office of Legal Counsel within the Department of Justice has issued highly classified, secret legal opinions related to surveillance," Whitehouse said in a Dec. 7, 2007 floor statement. "This is an administration that hates answering to an American court, that wants to grade its own exams, and OLC is the inside place the administration goes to get legal support for its spying program."

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