Leave it to Congress to take a good idea and mess it up.

The good idea was to establish a national Amber Alert communications network to aid in the rapid recovery of abducted children. Given recent high-profile abduction cases and the alert's proven success in various local and state versions, few could find fault with the concept.

But the House didn't stop there, or even with a package of measures related to the prevention and punishment of child abduction. After a stand-alone Amber Alert passed the Senate, House leaders loaded it up with 20 major crime-related provisions, perhaps the most egregious of which restricts federal judges' discretion in sentencing for crimes against children and sex offenses.

This is a major change that should have been debated on its own merits, but wasn't. Legislators couldn't vote against abducted children, so the compromise bill passed the House 400-25, then sailed through the Senate 98-0. It's an old trick: Take a sure-fire winner and encrust it with legislative barnacles that might not pass on their own.

In this case, some of the crime-fighting measures - ones that address kidnapping, sex trafficking and the like - make this a stronger package for protecting children and deterring would-be predators. House Judiciary Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., correctly argued that a stand-alone Amber Alert would do little but codify what President Bush already did by funding and staffing a national alert coordination program in the Justice Department.

But House GOP leaders used the bill to fill their criminal justice wish list. It expands the use of wiretaps. It establishes new mandatory minimum and life sentences. It eliminates the statute of limitations in child abductions. One provision makes it a crime to use a misleading Internet domain name to fool adults into viewing obscenity. Another doubles the sentence for an adult who uses a minor to commit a violent crime.

Whatever their merits or flaws, these ideas should have had vigorous debate instead of being tacked onto a bill you couldn't oppose. U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist is among those who object to the sentencing restrictions. They're concerned the bill may further erode judicial authority and civil liberties. They have reason to be concerned.